War Between the States
by KuryakinGirl
Summary: On the run from the FBI, the Winchester boys think they've found a safe haven and perhaps a reprieve from work until, that is, they find themselves at the center of a troubling possession--their own. Sequel to Ramble On.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer—Recognizable characters belong to Eric Kripke. No copyright infringement intended. Any similarity to events or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Author's Notes—This has been a long time in coming... and I hope it actually comes together this time as opposed to the 12 other times I've attempted this sequel. Follows Ramble On. Many thanks to PenKnight for long nights and plot bouncing.

Spoilers—Pilot, late first season, mid-late second season. Takes place immediately following Folsom Prison Blues, before What Is and What Should Never Be.

Feedback—Always greatly appreciated.

The War Between the States—On the run from the FBI, the Winchester boys think they've found a safe haven and perhaps a reprieve from work until, that is, they find themselves at the center of a troubling possession--their own.

* * *

Then...

Dean meets and befriends Darcy Ryan, a worker at the New Orleans City Morgue, who helps him battle Opal Moon, an undead voodoo priestess.

Now...

* * *

She was the only one in the building--exactly the way she preferred it. It was late, but she didn't have much longer to go. She ran her fingers through her dark hair, watching as the digital clock on the display in front of her flickered from 10:47 to 10:48. Less than an hour and fifteen minutes now. She could handle that.

Leaning back in her chair, she let her eyes close for a moment, though not for long. Something seemed to be just out of reach, right at the edge of her senses, something… familiar. Something sweet… Something she couldn't quite put her finger on... or could she?

Someone, she realized.

The thoughts came to her suddenly, unbidden, filling her mind: a close call, a harrowing experience; a new friend, old enemies...

But, would he remember an old friend? Could he still remember her?

Immediately getting to her feet, she poked through a stack of hard plastic cases lining shelves along the back wall, she selected a CD with a smile, before sliding it into the empty player and finding the right track. Easing back into her chair, she waited until the song playing started to end, and leaned forward, flipping a switch as she pulled the microphone closer to her. "You're listening to WXMT FM, Eclectic Rock on your Radio, broadcasting live from high atop Pine Ridge." Her voice was warm, sultry in the cool, spring evening air. "This next song is for someone special, a blast from my past... This is for you, Dean Winchester."

* * *

It was suddenly silent, save for the radio, in the '67 Impala as he maneuvered along the curvy, hilly Tennessee highway, heading east, out of the dodge they'd just left in Arkansas. He blinked. No way. It couldn't be... could it? Occasionally, sure, he wondered how she was doing, but he figured, like the hundred of others who'd breezed into and right back out of his life, that he'd never see her again.

His brother, riding shotgun, looked at him expectantly. "Dean..."

"Mm?" he managed, a slight smile coming to his lips as he realized the band now rocking out over the airwaves was Metallica. She'd remembered, after, what, almost two years?

"There anything you want to tell me?"

"Uh..."

"Please tell me you didn't really revert to a caveman and can speak coherently in more than just 'mms' and 'uhs.'" Sam was not really liking the whole idea of mentioning his brother's name on the radio. He was a _fugitive_ after all; they both were.

"Last I knew, she was still in New Orleans."

"Dean... _who_?"

"Darcy," he said, a slight smile forming on his lips.

"You realize she just gave away our position, right?"

Dean glanced over, rolling his eyes. "C'mon. 'Eclectic Rock on your Radio'? Like our friend Agent Henricksen is going to be tuning in to a small-town radio station in, best I can tell, the middle of nowhere."

"Maybe not him, no, but maybe... Maybe some local yokel has seen the most-wanted list with our names attached and just contacted the nearest FBI _field_ office," said Sam, unable to keep the ire out of his voice.

"Even if that were so... I'd say the safest place we can be right now is at that radio station," he said, pointing at the dial on the dash.

"You'd say that's the safest place? I'd say the safest place is as far away from Arkansas as we can get before sunup!"

"Sammy, relax. Stopping in to say hi for five minutes won't hurt. If you want, you can take the Impala, get us some grub, and pick me back up and we'll be back on the road before you know it."

"Who's this girl, Dean? Some other conquest?"

"No."

He answered just a little too quickly for Sam's liking. "Dude, c'mon..."

"She's not 'some other' conquest. She was never…" He paused. "Conquested."

"But, you wouldn't mind..."

Thinking thoughts like that would've gotten him into serious trouble back in New Orleans. "Sammy, she's a good girl. She helped me out. I just want to say hey."

The younger Winchester sighed heavily.

"Five, ten minutes max. You might even like her."

"Ten minutes. I'm holding you to it."

Dean grinned as he slowly cruised through downtown, since the deserted highway had turned into Main Street. He glanced around, unsure of where the radio station was. He was about to decide to try to call the station, provided they could find the number, when her voice came back on the radio, over the end of the Metallica track. "Turn left, up ahead on the right…"

Sam looked quizzically at Dean, who merely followed the directions.

The radio station was housed in a brick building, with the call letters spelled out in crisp white along the side. The parking lot itself was completely empty, but the lights shone warmly through the windows. By the time they started climbing out of the Impala, Darcy Ryan, the nighttime disk jockey, was at the front door, holding it open.

She wasn't quite what Sam had expected, not that he had been able to form much of an opinion from the little information Dean had given on the drive over. She was shorter than he'd figured, but still a pretty brunette, though perhaps not what he figured Dean thought of as conventionally attractive which might've explained the lack of "conquest."

Darcy glanced over at Sam as they neared the steps leading up to the door. It was, by no means, a casual look. She was quickly distracted, though, by the hug Dean suddenly wrapped her up in. "Hey," she said, laughing as she realized her feet were no longer touching the floor.

"How've you been?" he asked, setting her back on the ground.

"Much better, as you can see," she said, remembering well the last time he probably saw her, asleep in a hospital bed. She could also see he had one hell of a shiner. "What happened to you?" she asked, reaching up with gentle fingers to touch the left side of his face, which was bruised and swollen.

"Occupational hazard," he said, consciously making an effort to keep his thoughts in check as she touched him. His heart, however, beat a little faster.

"You need some ice?"

"Nah," he said, shaking his head. He cleared his throat a little, moving on. "You left New Orleans."

She shrugged as she slowly pulled back. "It was time to move on. Too much big city noise. Who's your friend?" she asked, again glancing at Sam.

"This is my brother Sam. Sammy, Darcy."

Sam held his hand out politely. "It's nice to meet you."

Darcy took it. "Likewise, I'm sure. Sammy... Dean... Your dad wasn't Frank, was he?" she asked, looking back up at Dean.

He shook his head. "John..."

"Just checking." She smiled. "Come on in," she said, entering into the station's lobby. It was somewhat cozy, with a desk in the center, a couple guest chairs lining the wall, some plants. There were two control rooms, one opposite the front door, the other to the right of the entrance, both clearly visible through large picture windows.

'I didn't realize the Rat Pack qualified as eclectic rock.' Sam slid his hands into his jeans pockets as he glanced around. "So, how do you know Dean? I don't think I've ever heard him mention you before."

"I don't expect he would. It was a long time ago now," she said, glancing up at Dean. He'd grown up; perhaps they both had. "He spent some time in New Orleans, crashed at my place."

"That voodoo thing I told you about, before I came to get you in California..." Dean supplemented.

"So, she's been hunting," Sam said. That made some sense, he decided.

She was standing right there, and he was going to talk about her, around her? She frowned, annoyed. "I guess I have."

Sam's thoughts, however, continued. 'That makes a lot of sense, actually, why he was never with Jo, either. Female hunters just aren't Dean's speed. He prefers to be with the ones that have never fought the ghosts and goblins we fight. Like Hollywood starlets.' He tried not to wince, thinking about a rocking trailer.

Darcy cleared her throat. "I, um, gotta check on the music, but can you stay, Dean?" she asked, looking up at him.

Before Sam could insist on their brief time limit, Dean said: "You bet."

She smiled, heading into the control room.

"Ten minutes, remember?" Sam whispered, glancing at her as she eased down behind the microphone.

He sighed. "C'mon, Sammy; we just got here."

"And we've got to get moving before the FBI catches up to us. I'm sure if you told her, she'd understand. You can get her phone number if you want to catch up that badly."

"Even if we were to run, eventually they'd catch up to us."

"Eventually is not now, Dean, not mere hours after we left lock-up in Little Rock."

"And I told you before, but you forgot... that this," he said, gesturing to the station around them, "is the safest place we could be right now."

"You never explained as to _why_ that was."

"Because of her," he said, glancing back up at Darcy, who winked at him as she continued to talk on the air.

"My head seriously hurts right now." Sam rubbed absently at his forehead.

"She's special, Sammy."

Sam looked up at Dean, praying he'd continue without being prompted again.

"She can read thoughts. That's what she was talking about: city noise. This place is a one horse town, if that."

Sam exhaled slowly, instantly in work-mode. "What about her mom?"

"Alive and kicking, or was almost two years ago when she decided to be a royal bitch and not come down to the hospital when Darcy was comatose..."

"What?"

"Long story," Dean admitted. "Long story short... Darcy's been estranged from her family since she was a teenager."

"She wasn't adopted? I mean, she could be one of us... one of the people like me," Sam said urgently.

"Perhaps you've forgotten: we only figured this stuff out about you fairly recently. I haven't seen or talked to Darcy since then and didn't really think about the fact that she might be in the same boat."

Sam glanced over his shoulder at her, as she pushed the mic away from her face.

"So, do you want to leave now, try to outrun the G-men without the benefits of a psychic... or stick around, see if Darcy's part of the yellow-eyed demon's plans and depend on her FBI radar...?"

Sam looked back at Dean, sighing heavily.

"Staying put it is," he said, grinning widely.

"I'm not sure which of your plans is worse… intentionally getting arrested... or intentionally abandoning our escape plan."

Dean chose to ignore his brother's snarky comments and made his way quietly into the control room, where Darcy was programming up the next music selections. "So..."

She glanced over at him. "Is he always so quick to judge?"

"Sammy?"

She nodded.

"Sometimes. We both can be, though, y'know. I'm sure it's in the genes somewhere."

She could tell he was trying to diffuse the situation, and she chose to let it go. There were more important things than to worry about Sam's initial reaction to her. Like the fact that she was face to face with the one person who understood her again. "It's good to see you. I wasn't sure our paths would ever cross again."

"I'm glad they did," he admitted.

She smiled. "So... what's up with the FBI?" she asked. "I didn't catch all of what your brother was thinking – he thinks fast."

"If you were to hear the thoughts of a pissed-off law enforcement agent... would you let us know?"

"Sure."

"The Feds pegged two murders on me, and a couple other nasty, not-as-headline grabbing crimes on me and Sam. The murders, I didn't do. Grave desecration, well, maybe they have a case there… They caught up to us in Arkansas but we've got a bit of a head start."

"If you need to go, Dean, I don't want to be the reason you guys get busted."

"We actually might need to talk to you, get some more information, see if you're... special like Sammy."

She looked at him quizzically.

"It'll take a while to explain," he said, momentarily flashing on his childhood home burning, taking Sam out of their house at his father's order...

She closed her eyes tightly, wincing. She'd remembered that from before, from when he stayed with her in her New Orleans apartment, how his thoughts – so intense, so vibrant – had pulled her from her sleep. They were just as strong today. She eased down in her chair. "I've got the time if you do."

Dean motioned through the picture window for Sam to join them, before taking the co-anchor's chair beside Darcy. Sam pulled a chair from the lobby to sit with them.

"We've determined that there are certain people with certain abilities," Dean began slowly. "Sam can see the future, sometimes. He can't really control it; it just happens. When Sam turned six months old, our mother was killed... by what we now know is a yellow-eyed demon bastard. Dad spent the rest of his entire adult life hunting things, trying to find what killed Mom."

She didn't have to ask if they ever found it. Sam was thinking about their last encounter with the demon, the encounter that put both Dean and John in the hospital, and where John's life ended.

"This sick demon definitely has a pattern, where bad things happen when you're six months old," Dean continued.

Darcy shook her head, tucking her dark hair behind her ear. "No trauma. Nothing like that, not then."

"Your mom, that's your real mom, not an adoptive mom, not a step-mom...? There wasn't a surrogate or anything?" asked Sam.

"Yeah. No. I mean, if she wasn't my mom, I think I'd have heard something."

Sam frowned. "How long have you had this ability?"

"Since I was a kid. It was all just… noise. I couldn't really make it out, couldn't focus, couldn't determine who was saying what, just... a jumble of voices, all talking over each other. I used to get horrible headaches. I went to specialists for years. They put me on something that seemed to make it all go away. I couldn't tell you now what it was – migraine medicine maybe – but it worked great, except for my sister's thoughts. I don't know why, but I always knew what she was thinking. She... accepted the fact, thought it was kinda cool. We had a lot of inside jokes. We were really close. Really close."

Sam intuitively picked up on the past tense. "Were?"

"When I was seventeen, the medicine stopped working. Sheila, my sister, was at Georgetown University, a junior. One night, I was home, studying for a test and all, of the sudden, I could hear her thoughts, clearly, screaming at me, as if she were in the room with me. That had never happened before." Darcy's face contorted in pain, retelling the story she'd never told, not since that night. Never talking about it, she never got past it. The pain was just as hurtful as it was all those years ago. "I'd never felt her, heard her thoughts from so far away before..."

Dean reached out, hesitantly placing a hand on hers and squeezing encouragingly.

"I ran out of my room, told my parents something was wrong with her, but they didn't believe me... not until the police came knocking at our door two hours later, saying she'd been killed in a car accident." She laughed a little. "In Pennsylvania. We were in suburban D.C., in Virginia. Mom was furious with me, told me not to speak one word about what had happened because obviously I was mistaken and that story didn't need repeating. But I knew what she was thinking: I was a freak, something was wrong with me, something was... horrifically wrong."

"Nothing's wrong with you, Darcy," Dean told her gently.

"The medicine never worked again after that night," she told him. "It was like... losing my sister, my best friend shook something lose in my head. I almost overdosed on that medicine trying to make my parents' thoughts stop. It didn't just work, nothing did."

Sam frowned: what if Darcy's sister was special, too? But, no, Dean wasn't special, not as far as he could tell. Nothing seemed to indicate he was anything out of the ordinary, excepting of course his day (and night) job. Darcy'd had her power so long and Sam had only discovered his about a year ago. He wondered how far her hearing normally reached. Did it normally extend past state boarders now?

"No," Darcy said, looking over at Sam.

He blinked. "I haven't said anything."

"What were you thinking, Sammy?" Dean asked.

"Just... your range," he said, looking at Darcy. "If you heard your sister from states away, if you heard Dean's thoughts once we entered the county... how far does it normally reach?"

"The closer someone is, the louder their thoughts are," she said.

"Are we talking proximity... or intensiveness of friendship?" Sam asked, trying to keep his thoughts from venturing down whether or not Dean had been truthful with him as to the actual nature of their relationship.

Darcy narrowed her green eyes slightly. "Proximity, generally speaking. I don't know how I heard Dean from so far away," she said, glancing back at the Winchester sitting beside her.

"We only spent about two weeks together, and most of that time, she was in intensive care in a coma," Dean said, looking again at his younger brother. "Voodoo-induced, but, y'know... "

Sam frowned. "We can check weather history for around the time she turned six months old... check the newspaper archives..."

Dean nodded, then turned and smiled at Darcy. "You wouldn't happen to have a place we could crash, would you? Y'know, give our credit cards a break from seedy hotels, less things for the Feds to sniff..."

She laughed softly, remembering well how they met... with her working the late shift, with him needing some place to stay. "You bet," she said with a nod.

He grinned broadly.

"In fact..." She looked at the clock along the side wall. "My shift ends in about a little under an hour."

Dean nodded. "Plenty of time to get a head start, huh, Sammy?"

He slowly got to his feet. "I'll go get the laptop."

* * *

The Road Ahead...

"Dean, you said yourself you didn't know this girl very well, you didn't spend _that_ much time with her awake..."

"We both might've died in New Orleans if we hadn't worked together. I trust her and so should you."

"No offense, but sometimes your opinion of girls and their opinion of you tend to differ..."


	2. Chapter 2

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.

Then...

On the run from Arkansas fresh off their jail break, Dean and Sam are waylaid in Tennessee by a sultry voice on the radio belonging to Darcy Ryan, who worked with Dean on his first "solo" hunt before John Winchester went missing. Sam is reluctant to stay but the Winchester boys decide they should figure out if Darcy is attached to the Yellow-Eyed Demon's plans, if she's "special" like Sam.

Now...

* * *

Sam sat in the lobby, picking up the radio station's wireless Internet access, as he punched information into various search engines, both credible sites and more questionable sites – ones linked to the paranormal. He looked deep in thought, and Dean was content to stay in the control room with Darcy while she did her disk jockey thing.

"Sammy's a good guy," Dean said. "I didn't warn him about what you could do... So, if he had any... unkind thoughts... he wouldn't have had them had I told him," he said, looking over at her.

"It doesn't matter. I hear a lot. I hear a lot of what people think of me. It's not new. It's not that big a deal either."

"Still."

"Thoughts generally aren't sugar coated, Dean. That's why they're thoughts. Y'know, yours weren't either, when I met you," she said, smiling at the memory.

"Yeah, not one of my finer moments, I'm sure."

"Well... hunting voodoo high priestesses tends to solidify a friendship, I guess."

He nodded, smiling. "Something like that."

She was silent for a moment, but she had to know. "Why did you stay? Your job was done once we got rid of the priestess, right? I mean, the killer. You caught her, sent her back to wherever she came from. I remember that part. I was just... collateral, right? The cost of doing business."

"You were hurt. And the way the doctors were talking, it wasn't... natural."

"'Bayou fever.' That's what they called it. What really happened to me, Dean? Why was I out so long? Somehow I think you had to have a hand in my cure."

He exhaled. "I don't know why you'd think that," he said casually. He'd promised himself then not to reveal to her the truth, what had brought her back to life. He didn't really want her to know. He didn't want her to feel obligated somehow. He carefully controlled his thoughts, thinking about the aftermath of his actions, about her waking up, rather than his proactive steps. "I'd gone out for some air. When I came back, the doctors and nurses were all in and out of your room. I, uh..." He shook his head, but did reveal one piece of information he hadn't let her know before. "I thought you were dead."

She watched his face and listened as he recalled that event. He'd been worried--scared--for her.

"Then you were awake and breathing and talking and... all that good stuff."

She was silent for a moment. "Thank you for staying with me."

He shrugged it off.

"Seriously," she said. "Thanks."

He flashed her a grin. "Thanks for putting up with me and my brother a couple days."

"Well, it's only fair. I dunno, though, I've only seen you in work mode. We should do something that's not work related, see the other side of you."

His eyebrows slid up his forehead slightly, amused. "You have something in mind?" He had to keep his thoughts in check as her look turned impishly mischievous.

"How much gas is in the Impala?"

"Half a tank..."

"Perfect," she said, smiling.

"You want to tell me where we're going?"

"Not yet," she said, shaking her head.

"Well, then, how are we going to get there?"

"I'll navigate once I sign off."

"Y'know, this place looks like a sunset town. Is there anything going to be open then?"

She leaned in towards him slightly. "Who said I was taking you to a place that opens or closes?"

He frowned, making her grin.

Before he could say anything further, she pulled the microphone between them. She hit a button on a CD player, starting the next song, and flipped a switch. "That was another solid-rock block from WXMT FM, at one-oh-six point three on your dial, home of Eclectic Rock on your Radio," she said into the microphone. She gave Dean a soft smile. "I'd like to welcome a special visitor to the station tonight. Dean, why don't you say hey to all the folks out there in Radio Land."

He blinked. "Uh... Hey." He looked from her, to Sam, sitting just beyond the glass window, shrugging.

Sam didn't look too amused.

"Ladies and gentlemen, a big round of applause for our radio virgin." Darcy tapped the weather display on the control board in front of them. "Why don't you let our awesome listeners know what time it is and the temperature."

"Uh, it's eleven-forty-two PM and, uh... fifty-eight degrees."

"A balmy, beautiful night out there, not a cloud in the sky. Perfect for a little stargazing with a little Led Zeppelin," she said, cutting off the microphone in time to finish Stairway to Heaven's long instrumental introduction.

Dean chuckled. "That was pretty cool."

"You did good, for me throwing you in head first," she said, grinning.

'That was so stupid.'

Her smile faltered as she looked out at Sam, who was shaking his head while looking at his laptop.

"Darcy?" Dean asked, frowning.

"Sorry, passing car," she fibbed, looking back over at Dean. "Somebody's pissed," she said, shrugging. "Anyway, we can blow this joint in about fifteen. I'll let the automated DJ take over and we'll hit the road."

"Automated?"

"The future of radio. We tap into DJ Joe's Freak Show from outta Atlanta, so nobody's here from about midnight to six AM. Up until a couple years ago, this station still had a graveyard shift DJ. I'm not sure anyone does anymore. Turns out I left one dying field and got into another..." He chuckled, making her smile. "You should tell your brother to pack up. Tell him I want to take you guys on a brief reprieve, shouldn't take more than about a half hour, forty-five minutes or so. I'll finish up everything here."

"Sounds good," Dean said, getting to his feet. He crossed to the lobby, flopping down in the chair beside Sam. "How's it going?"

"Nothing really unusual, not as far as I can tell. Not yet, anyway."

"Maybe she's special in a different way."

"Maybe she's not really that special at all."

Dean frowned. "What's going on, dude?"

"Nothing," he said, glancing up at Darcy, who was sliding CDs back into their spots along the rack on the wall.

If Sam wanted it dropped, fine with him. He'd move on: "Hey, listen, Darcy wants to show us some place. You up for a road trip?"

"You don't know where?" he asked, looking over at Dean.

"She didn't say, no."

"Dean, you said yourself you didn't know this girl very well, you didn't spend _that_ much time with her awake..."

"We both might've died in New Orleans if we hadn't worked together. I trust her and so should you."

"Look, no offense, but sometimes your opinion of girls and their opinion of you tend to differ... Who's to say she's not in there right now sending an e-mail to the authorities and our little trip to some unknown place is really the sheriff's department, so we can sit in yet another holding cell for the second time in as many days until Henricksen shows up."

While they were sitting there, talking quietly amongst themselves, she emerged from the control room, leaning against the open door. "There isn't much to see here in town, no, but if you'd listened to what I said earlier, you boys might've picked up on it when I had Dean give the time and temp..."

Dean and Sam both turned to see her. It was Dean who put it together first. "Stargazing."

"Pine Ridge is a ten minute drive from here, about a four minute walk to the tower site... it's breathtaking. You guys must see so much death and destruction and things that are so utterly grotesque, I thought it might be a nice change of pace. Sam... I don't know what to do to prove to you that my heart's in the right place... I have no intention of turning either of you in. I think if everybody knew, if everybody really knew what was out there... they'd want you out on the streets, too. But, in the meantime, if I can shelter you guys, give you guys a break, a mini-vacation even, until the heat dies down... I'm happy to. I want to."

"I'm sure you understand, Darcy, that sometimes we have to be really very cautious about who we're around," Sam began, his thoughts landing briefly on Meg, who he'd thought was a friend, who'd turned out to be a demon.

"So, let's prove it," she said, nodding. "How can you tell, if I'm a demon or not? You guys must know some sort of trick or something," she said, glancing from Sam to Dean.

"We are not even remotely considering that you're a demon," Dean said, narrowing his eyes at Sam.

"Holy water. It'll take two seconds," Sam said, looking at his older brother.

"In the Impala, right, the trunk?" she asked, having a vague recollection of the tools of the trade hidden in the trunk's false bottom. "Go get it."

"Sammy," Dean said warningly.

"No, Dean, I want to," Darcy said. "Better for you guys to be safe rather than sorry, right? Go get it," she repeated, looking again at Sam.

He handed the laptop off to Dean, and headed out to the car, popping the trunk.

"Why?" Dean asked, frowning.

"Because maybe he'll stop thinking what he's been thinking the past hour," she said quietly. "He's entitled to his thoughts, and not really entitled to a thought-stealer, but..." She sighed. "I don't think you strong-arming him into being nice to me would've worked, so... let's have this little field test and get it over with. We'll go see Pine Ridge, we'll go home... You can stay and hang out a while... it'll be nice, for a change, for the both of us. Maybe even all three," she said, looking up as Sam reentered the station. "So, what is this, like a baptism... do I get sprinkled or dunked or something?"

"Hold out your hand," Sam said, glancing tentatively at his brother, who seemed to be accepting.

Darcy held her hand out to him, her palm open. Uncapping the bottle, Sam poured a small amount of water into her hand and it looked... like regular water. "You sure you didn't just grab the Dasani there?"

"No, it's holy water," he said, nodding.

"Am I a demon?"

"If you were, you'd be smoking," Dean explained. "Are you satisfied, Sammy?"

The younger Winchester nodded. "Thank you."

"Cool, well... now that it was totally anticlimactic – but in a good way – I'm gonna sign off, set the alarm... and we'll get out of here. Sound good?" she asked, looking from Sam to Dean.

"Pine Ridge, yeah?" Dean asked.

She smiled. "Pine Ridge."

The Winchesters headed out to the Impala, while Darcy set about turning off lights and shutting down.

"Y'know, too, with Madison being... what she was..." Sam began haltingly.

"In this situation, let's say that we were both right. You were right to make sure she was what she said she was... but I was right 'cause I knew she wasn't a demon."

Sam nodded. "Fair enough."

Dean was silent for a moment. "Technically, I was more right."

"Shut up."

"Bitch," Dean playfully spat, fighting a smile.

"Jerk," Sam returned.

"You guys aren't going to bicker like that the whole time, are you?" Darcy asked, locking the front door to the station, a black backpack over her shoulder.

"Brotherly love, Darcy," Dean explained.

"Or sibling rivalry," provided Sam.

"Dear God, what have I gotten myself into?" she asked, crossing down towards the Impala. "Shotgun, by the way..." she said, glancing over at Sam.

Sam's jaw fell open slightly. "Hey..."

"She's a girl, Sammy," Dean said, sliding behind the wheel. "'Sides, she has to navigate."

Reluctantly, Sam climbed into the back, behind Dean, as Darcy let herself into the passenger seat.

On the way up to Pine Ridge, Dean and Darcy filled Sam in on all the details of their voodoo hunting experience, from their first encounter in the morgue, to the death-defying stunts in the bayou surrounding the Big Easy.

"I can't believe it's been almost two years now," Darcy said, as the Impala turned off the state highway and onto a dirt road.

Dean turned his brights on. "I can't believe you have a radio tower off a dirt road."

"Apparently it used to be in the middle of somebody's farm, so they were very happy when it got moved. And our listening area increased, so, it worked out for everybody."

"Uh... Darcy?" Dean asked, seeing that, up ahead, the dirt road seemed to come to a complete and total stop. That, or trees had decided to take up roots in the middle of the street.

"Yeah, I told you a four minute walk, right?" she said, glancing over at Dean.

"It's a good thing there are flashlights in the trunk," Sam said, looking out his side window into the darkness.

The Impala rumbled to a stop, and Dean turned off the engine. As Darcy emerged from her seat, she dug through her backpack, finding her own flashlight and turning it on so Dean could see to get into the trunk.

He pulled out two flashlights, checking both of them, before handing one off to Sam. "After you," he told Darcy.

She led them along the path. It was starting to become slightly grown over with the new spring foliage.

Dean fell into step behind her, with Sam trailing along. "Y'know, I bet you guys could make a killing at Halloween. Creepy hiking. Tell ghost stories," Dean suggested, turning his flashlight upside down under his face.

"With a great soundtrack," she laughed.

"Monster Mash," said Sam.

Darcy smiled. Maybe, now that he was convinced she wasn't entirely evil, he'd actually come to enjoy a couple days off, too. "Exactly."

"Charge five bucks a head," Dean said as he returned his flashlight to the trail before them.

"Beats credit card scams," commented Sam.

"Low blow, Sammy," chided Dean. They walked along in silence for a few more moments, before he started humming Dueling Banjos.

"So not funny, dude," Sam said immediately.

Darcy shook her head as she finished leading them along the short trial, coming to a stop in a wide clearing, where the radio tower stood straight and tall, secured by guy wires. "This is it," she said, turning off her flashlight.

Dean and Sam followed suit and glanced skyward. Millions of twinkling lights smiled down at them.

It was something the boys hardly bothered to look at. There was so much going on beneath those shining stars that required their attention at night that they were overlooked, seemingly unimportant. After all, there were no such things as aliens or alien abductions, as far as any hunter they knew were aware, so there was no need to look to the heavens. But vampires, zombies, and werewolves were entirely different stories.

"The thick trees down the ridge block out most of the city light. And the tower light, well... that doesn't distract too badly," Darcy said, glancing up at the flickering beacon. "Certainly better than the streetlights and everything back in town."

"Makes you think about how small you really are, in the grand scheme of things," Sam commented.

"Who you callin' small, Sammy?" Dean asked, easing to sit on the grassy ground.

"You're just one guy, Dean. I'm just one guy."

"And you guys do amazing things," Darcy said.

Dean shrugged. "Depends on who you ask. You? Sure. Agent Henricksen…?"

She eased to sit down next to Dean. "He can't help it if he's wrong. He's obviously never been face to face with a previously dismembered voodoo high priestess before."

Dean glanced over, grinning. "Hey, that's it. We'll just conjure up a ghost and present it to him."

"If only it were that easy," Sam said, sighing.

"It could be, Sammy; you never know."

As silence descended on the tower site, Darcy tried to keep her thoughts to herself, focusing on her own feelings at the moment. It was different, having someone around who knew what she could do. It was different, being around people who thought she was normal. It was... nice. Around Dean, she didn't have to feel like a freak. Around Dean, she could let her guard down a little. She didn't have to be quite so guarded with what she said, differentiating between what someone really told her and what she'd discerned.

She ran her fingers though her dark hair, glancing over at Dean, who was still looking at the beautiful navy blue blanket of stars surrounding them. He thought about how nice it would be, to be settle down somewhere, sometime, eventually. To be able to stop and look at the stars. Maybe someday, he thought as he leaned back, stretching out on the ground.

Sam, too, stretched out. His thoughts floated to Jess, to Madison. His luck with slowing down, trying to avoid the truths he knew existed always ended the same way: with death. Maybe if he didn't care, like Dean, bad things wouldn't happen. But, he couldn't turn off his emotions, could he? His humanity. Of course he couldn't. That wasn't who he was. He wasn't like Dean. He wasn't like his father.

Darcy fought hard to block Sam's thoughts. She focused on Sheila, on her memories of her sister. The times that Sheila covered for her, took care of her. The times when Darcy felt safe, protected. The times she felt important for keeping such a big secret from the world.

She was pulled from her thoughts, however, as Dean slowly sat up, before getting to his feet. She looked at him, trying to access his thoughts, but they weren't there. She glanced back at Sam, who seemed lost in thought, but she wasn't reading anything there either. The thoughts of the demons taking Jess away, the thoughts of Madison's destruction were all gone, completely so. But she could see the wheels turning, so clearly. Why couldn't she hear?

"Darlin'?"

That sort of sounded like Dean's voice, but there was a very distinctive Southern twang she was certain hadn't been there moments before. "Dean?" she asked, looking up at him.

He cocked his head to one side, questioningly. "Dean? Darlin', are you all right?" He offered her his hand, which she accepted, being pulled to her feet. "You haven't hurt yourself, have you?"

Again, Dean now looked like he should've been thinking something, but there were absolutely no other voices in Darcy's head. "No..."

"We're going to be late for the party, you know."

Darcy was starting to wonder if she was hallucinating. "Party?"

"You know how John loves to dance those reels."

She spun on her heel, noting well that Sam now had a drawl as well. John... They had said John was their father's name. "I..."

"Save a line on your dance card for me, won't you, Elizabeth?" Sam asked.

Elizabeth? John? The fact that they weren't thinking... Darcy tried to keep her jaw from falling clear to the ground and her eyes from growing to saucer-size as she put it all together: they were no longer themselves at all.

"Elizabeth?" Dean asked, his hand lightly finding the small of her back. The touch was so gentle, so electric, so... personal, almost intimate. "She looks frightful pale, don't you think, William?" he asked, looking at Sam.

"We could fetch Doc Fletcher," Sam said with a nod.

"Oh, no, no, no," Darcy said, afraid of who Doc Fletcher might turn out to be. Perhaps the Impala. Or the tower. Or, worse, something far more sinister.

"Are you sure, love?"

Darcy started to open her mouth, but had to stop and recollect her thoughts before trying to speak again. Hearing the word "love" come from Dean's lips, aimed at her was, well, breathtaking. Hearing it with the Southern accent that wasn't quite Dean's own voice, however, made it breathtaking in a not-so-good sort of way. "I'm fine," she managed, trying to keep the squeak out of her voice as best she could.

* * *

The Road Ahead...

"So, what do you think? You think we were temporarily possessed?"

Sam shrugged. "I dunno, but I think it might need a little checking out, make sure everything's kosher and that it won't happen again."

"Being a puppet to a two hundred year old dead guy? Yeah, that'd be nice if that never happened again."

"Where do we start?" Darcy asked.


	3. Chapter 3

For Notes and Disclaimer, please see part one.

Then...

Sam investigates the possible connections of paranormal/demonic activity to Darcy's birth while Darcy and Dean catch up. Sam's leery of trusting Darcy, and a quick test with holy water reveals she's no demonic possession walking around. With some trust established, she takes the boys up to Pine Ridge, the location of the radio station's broadcast tower, to hang out and stargaze, but things take a turn for the worse when the Winchesters pick up Southern accents and Darcy can no longer pick their brains.

Now...

* * *

She'd managed to keep Dean and Sam corralled near the tower site as the night wore on. But that was not without its troubles. The Winchesters bantered about the state of the union and the growing, grumbling grassroots confederacy that was building, and the possibilities that held for both sides. Darcy had a hard time with some of the old-fashioned language the boys used so effortlessly. It was almost as though she were trapped in a history lesson, with no where to go, no way to quietly cut class.

She was starting to feel lightheaded as she glanced at her watch, realizing that they'd been up there five, almost six hours. The sun would be rising soon. She wanted Dean back. She wanted to hear Sam's biting thoughts. Hell, she'd settle for a relived memory, one of the horribly vivid ones, where the pain was still deep and practically fresh.

Rubbing her eyes, she wondered what she was supposed to do if this was permanent. Maybe she could get a hold of one of their cell phones and just start calling random numbers on their contact list until she found someone who didn't hang up on her when she talked about all things supernatural. She leaned back, lounging on the grass and keeping a weary, bloodshot eye on the brothers. She was normally in bed by about one, up by nine. She was going on twenty-one hours with no sleep and was definitely starting to become exhausted.

She started catching her head drifting down before yanking it back up and forcing her eyes open. As the sunlight started filtering through the leaves of the trees, Sam and Dean's conversation stopped. 'Maybe even Civil War soldiers get tired of hearing themselves talk,' she decided.

'What the hell?'

'Is it daylight?'

She jumped up, as though kicked. "Dean?"

"Darcy?"

Dean's voice had returned to normal, and Darcy found a second wind, catapulting herself towards him, wrapping her arms around him. "Thank _God_! I was beginning to wonder!"

"We're still up at the tower?" Sam asked, noting well that it appeared that they hadn't moved since just after midnight.

"What the _hell_ is going on?" Dean asked as Darcy slowly disentangled herself from him.

"I have no idea where to even begin, but I think we should all start by getting off this rock."

"Did we sleep up here?" Dean asked, as Darcy started to lead them back towards the path to the Impala.

"I'm not sure sleeping was something you guys did at all," she said slowly.

"Just exactly what did we do?" asked Sam.

"We were all having a nice, quiet, reflective moment under the stars when your thoughts both went blank."

Dean looked at her, an eyebrow drifting up his forehead. "Come again?"

"Completely silent. Y'know, people may _say_ they're not thinking about anything, but generally speaking, there are thoughts," she said, talking quickly. "Whether it's 'hey, that's a cool car' or 'mm, pie.' There's some sort of activity. From you two there was absolutely _nothing_... except for Southern accents--thick ones--and a seemingly endless dissertation on the reasons for and against the upcoming potential war." Her words came fast, thanks to the adrenaline realization that Dean and Sam returned to their normal states.

Sam's thoughts immediately jumped to the yellow-eyed demon and his plans for some sort of impending battle.

"No, Sam," she said, glancing over at him. "Not an upcoming _now_ war, an upcoming _then_ war." She stopped the hike towards the car, looking from Sam to Dean. "Best I can tell, you guys were talking about the _Civil_ War. The 1860s war."

"North won, slavery's bad kind of stuff?" Dean asked.

"Yeah, except, again, it was like it hadn't happened yet, the states hadn't aligned themselves yet. Tennessee was still in the Union, but the war was _coming_."

"We were saying this?" Dean said, gesturing between himself and Sam.

She nodded. "You were John." She pointed then to Sam. "You were William. I was Elizabeth." She started walking again, and the boys fell in step with her. "There was Doc Fletcher, and the Robertsons who were having a party with dance cards and reels and the whole nine yards."

Sam frowned. "You were Elizabeth? You were conscious during this?"

"You guys were _calling_ me Elizabeth. Dean said my dress was nice…" She looked down at her jeans and tee shirt. "What dress! Do you see a dress? The whole night was just... freaky."

"I couldn't tell you much about the Civil War except slavery's bad and the North won. I was talking about other things?" Dean asked.

"With authority. It was like straight out of Gone with the Wind, I swear."

"I'm Rhett, right?" Dean asked with a roguish grin. "Sam's the one that marries his cousin...?"

"I think you're missing the point, Dean," said Sam with a heavy sigh.

"And that is?" scoffed Dean.

"Darcy, do any of those names mean anything to you?"

She thought for a moment, before a proverbial light bulb lit up over her head. "The hospital has the Fletcher Medical Office Building."

Sam continued: "What about the Robertsons?

"No," she said, "but, then again I haven't been here that long." She was relieved as the Impala came into view.

Sam and Dean exchanged glances.

"So, what do you think? You think we were temporarily possessed?"

Sam shrugged. "I dunno, but I think it might need a little checking out, make sure everything's kosher."

"Being a puppet to a two hundred year old dead guy? Yeah, that'd be nice if that never happened again."

"Where do we start?" Darcy asked.

"Is there a local historical society?" Sam asked. Off Darcy's nod, he continued. "I could meet with someone from the society; you guys could check the library for local historical records, see if you can find these William, John and Elizabeth people, then meet back up for lunch."

"Sounds good to me," Dean said. "Darcy, you feel up for it?"

"So long as it doesn't involve you guys in Southern accents and me in a hoop skirt, whether real or imagined, I'm up for it." She checked her watch. "Library doesn't open till eight... We could run to my house, grab showers, breakfast..."

"Where to?" Dean asked, sliding behind the wheel of the Impala.

Sam retreated to the backseat again as Darcy took shotgun, talking them back down from Pine Ridge and towards her rented home, a mile from the radio station. It was a quaint cottage-looking house, with pale yellow siding and green shutters, a tiny front porch and yard. "Home, sweet home," she said, climbing out of the car.

Sam and Dean stopped by the trunk, grabbing their duffel bags before following her into the house. The living room had the same comfortable couch Dean remembered from New Orleans, with the ottoman for a coffee table, a small TV, and bookshelves lining the walls.

"You like to read, huh?" Sam asked Darcy.

Dean chuckled, easing his bag onto the laminate floor at his feet. "Take a closer look, there, Sammy."

Sam wandered over, setting his laptop case on the ottoman, and realized that she had a music collection to rival Dean's, with records, both 78s and 45s, eight-tracks, tapes, CDs... "Wow..."

"Noise reduction... in a very weird way," Darcy said, moving into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee.

Dean, who'd followed her into the kitchen, moved behind her, and whispered: "I can make it if you wanna go ahead and grab that shower..."

She casually glanced over her shoulder, only then realizing just how close to her he was. Her thoughts immediately retreated to a few hours ago, when possessed-Dean had been so kind and loving. "Maybe that's a good idea," she breathed, nodding.

"Sure you're okay?"

"Peachy," she said with a soft smile.

"All right," Dean said as she started to head down the hallway to the bathroom. He looked at the coffee pot. How many scoops was it supposed to be again?

"Three," came the answer from down the corridor, causing Dean to chuckle slightly.

When Sam heard the water running, he joined Dean in the kitchen, leaning against the cabinet. "So, what all do you know about Darcy, from before New Orleans?"

"Not too much. You know most of it, too, now, I think," he said, carefully measuring coffee ground scoops.

"So, you don't know anything about her family."

"Except they disowned her, no," he said, looking up at Sam sharply. "What are you getting at?"

"When I was looking into her birth, to see if any of those tell-tale signs pointed to her being part of the demon's plan..."

"Right," Dean said, filling the carafe with water to complete the coffee making process. "And you didn't find anything."

"Well, nothing that links her to whatever dastardly plan he has, no, but I found other things... Other things like photos from a débutante cotillion."

"Darcy? A deb? Huh..."

"I saved the website on the hard drive of the laptop. Daughter of Deputy Secretary of State Nathan Ryan, escorted by the son of some Senator."

"I dunno if I was a dude and I had a regular job if I'd want the title 'secretary' anywhere near what I did. Even if 'deputy' was in there somewhere."

"Dean, as in Cabinet secretary. As in an appointed government position."

He glanced at his little brother. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Are you absolutely _sure_ that she doesn't have anything to do with her parents anymore?"

"Dude, you heard her give her story last night. Surely you, of all people, should know what it's like to estrange yourself from a family. You and I might've talked a couple times after you left for Stanford, but did you ever talk to Dad, even once?"

Sam shook his head.

"Case closed," he said, clapping his hands. "Let's see that picture, huh?"

Sam led him back into the living room, pulling out his laptop and starting it up. "Just do me a favor, would you?"

"What's that?" Dean asked.

"Just... I think you should be guarded around her, that's all."

Dean nodded. "Okay." Like hell, he thought to himself, wondering for a moment if Darcy could pick that up, or if the shower offered enough distraction to keep his thoughts from invading hers.

Sam seemed relived, and double-clicked on the website he'd saved on the desktop. In the photo, she looked to be about sixteen, with her dark hair in soft, shiny curls around her shoulders. She wore a simple white dress, on the arm of a guy in a tux. She was gorgeous, like a porcelain doll. Not that she wasn't beautiful still, but seeing her like that was sort of eye-opening, as Dean started to wonder if he'd finally found a girl who was out of his league.

"Wow," said Dean quietly.

* * *

Two hours later, after showers and a rather quiet breakfast, Sam had an appointment to meet with Julia Owens, the vice president of the historical society, and Dean and Darcy dropped him off at Kate's Cafe, the local breakfast haunt of choice, before heading on to the library.

Darcy couldn't help but notice that Dean had been practically mute since they'd left her house, and that his thoughts had intentionally been vague, almost misleading. "Are you okay?"

He glanced over at her. "Yeah. I'm good." He flashed her a grin, though she could tell there was no mirth behind his eyes.

She merely nodded as Dean pulled into a parking place in front of the local library. She climbed out of the Impala, heading inside with him.

The worker behind the circulation desk smiled as he saw them enter. "Our very own night owl radio voice. I'm amazed you're up this early."

"Hey, Ethan. Early birds and worms and all that."

"There anything I can help you with?" he asked, glancing from Darcy to Dean and back again.

Darcy smiled. "My friend here and I were hoping to do a little digging in the genealogy section. He thinks he has some family from here, lived up on Pine Ridge..."

"S'what my mom told me," Dean added, flashing this Ethan a smile as well.

He stood from behind his desk. "Right this way," he said, leading them to a small room off the main stacks with some computers and two walls of local reference books. "We have a computer program, Regional At-a-Glance Genealogy. Punch in some key words, see what pops up. You could put in names, for example, of people, locations within the county. Pine Ridge and... whatever surname."

"What about first names?" Darcy asked. "He's got some really old records, but the last names are a little blurred..."

"You can try, but you might hit everyone and their uncle..." Ethan laughed. "Literally."

Dean wondered what the hell that dude was smoking, which almost made Darcy chuckle.

"Sorry, genealogy humor... If you need anything, I'm right outside."

Dean waited until the door closed and Ethan was safely on the other side before speaking. "He seems like a fun dude to have at parties."

"I can only imagine," Darcy said, taking a seat at a computer terminal and starting the genealogy program.

Dean eased down beside her, sitting on the chair backwards, watching as Darcy started typing in keywords, to see what all they could come up with.

* * *

The Impala rumbled to a stop by the downtown War Memorial Park. It was tiny, and concrete encased, holding only two monuments, one citing all the local war dead from the World Wars, Korea and Vietnam, and the second, showing the local war dead from the Civil War. Sam was looking at the names on the Confederate and Union sides, shaking his head when the engine cut off and Dean and Darcy exited from the car.

"What'd you find out?" Dean asked.

"Reconstruction was pretty rough around here," Sam began, easing down on the bench facing the monuments. "There weren't any major battles of the war itself fought here, but there were certainly skirmishes. The majority of the antebellum homes were destroyed from the in-fighting families even after the war ended. I mean, look at that monument," he said, pointing towards the Civil War's split list of names. "Those are all county residents who gave up their lives for the war. Family names match on both sides, for Confederates and the Union."

Dean glanced over the lists.

"It was a brother-against-brother fight. Families were torn apart."

"All for slavery, huh?" asked Dean, leaning against the monument.

"Not here, not really," Sam said, shaking his head. "This region's always been pretty poor. If anybody owned any, maybe one here, one there... certainly not enough to make it prevalent. Did you guys find out anything more specifically on John and William?"

Darcy nodded. "All three died, presumably at about the same time: John and his wife Elizabeth Cantrell, and John's brother William Cantrell."

"John and Elizabeth were married?" Sam asked, glancing between Dean and Darcy.

"If they were, they certainly made no mention of it last night. In fact, at one point Dean…" Darcy stopped, to correct herself: "John… mentioned about talking to a Mr. Bailey, which happens to be Elizabeth's maiden name. Perhaps he was getting ready to ask for her hand."

"Deeds show that the Cantrell family home was up on Pine Ridge, about the location of the radio tower," Dean added.

Sam looked at Darcy. "You said the tower was built recently; did anyone tear down a house?"

She shook her head. "But, there is another connection... The engineering firm that built the tower was called ABE, Andrews Brothers Engineering. Three days after the work was completed, the lead engineers and partners in the company, Matthew and Westley, were killed in a murder-suicide."

"Brother against brother," Sam said, shaking his head. "No one realized they were acting strangely?"

"According to the police report, the employees of ABE said that the brothers were their normal, jovial selves in the days leading up to the deaths. The police figure one of them just must've snapped, realized he'd made a horrible mistake, and then killed himself," answered Dean.

"And the Cantrells, there's no way to tell which fired first?"

"Not a single witness," continued Dean. "Records show there was definitely some sort of domestic problem that arose between them. Elizabeth might've gotten caught in the crossfire, we don't know. There aren't any witness reports, just that the Robertsons--neighbors on Pine Ridge--discovered the grisly scene and they buried the family up there somewhere."

Sam sighed. "So, maybe the Andrews brothers really were normal during the day... and at night, the spirits of the Cantrell brothers took over. And they're replaying their final days."

"If that's the case, it would've been years later that the Andrews brothers killed each other," said Darcy. "I mean, building the tower didn't take _that_ long. You guys were talking about the impending war and they didn't die until after the war ended."

"Either way," said Dean, jumping into the conversation, "we have to move fast. If they were fine during the daylight and possessed at night... we should get a move on back to Pine Ridge and see if we can locate those bodies."

Darcy looked up at Dean. "What if you can't?"

"Well, this is a little personal for us," Dean said, glancing at Sam, "since it seems to invade brothers and posses them to kill each other. We have to find the bodies."

She nodded, fighting a yawn.

"We can drop you off at home; you can catch some sleep," he told her.

"I can help," she said, looking up at him. Her eyes, however, were heavy with sleep. "I got you guys into this mess; I took you up there for Creepy Thing One and Thing Two to invade."

"You didn't know that was going to happen. For all you knew, the engineers really did have problems," Sam provided.

"You're walking around like a freakin' zombie right now," Dean said. "You won't be much help to us up there like this... 'Sides, you really need to rest... we may need another Civil War babysitter tonight."

She inhaled slowly, knowing they were right. "It's not far to the house. You guys go on. That way I can at least give you a little more time to find the old bones."

"Darcy..." If it wasn't far, it wouldn't be a burden to run her by in the Impala. It might take, what, all of five minutes? Less?

She placed her hand on his arm gently. "Go, Dean," she said softly, yet firmly. She smiled at him, then turned to head back towards her house.

Sam stood, watching Dean watch Darcy walk away. "C'mon, man. Let's find these bones, get this done, and we'll all get a good night's sleep tonight."

He sighed, moving around to slide behind the wheel of his car, as Sam took the front passenger seat again. Dean was quiet, seemingly contemplative. He wasn't even fussing with the radio, blaring a hair band from a previous decade or two over the speakers.

Sam had seen Dean in a similar sort of mood, but only once before: when they were in Missouri helping out Cassie Robinson--the only other girl Dean had seemingly been up front and fully honest with. It had been nice, actually, to see that his brother really did have real feelings for a woman that weren't one-night-stand kinds of feelings. It was even sort of interesting to see this process from the beginning, as he'd only witnessed Dean's affection for Cassie as that ship seemed to be sailing.

"You really like her, huh?"

Dean glanced over at him briefly. "What?"

"Darcy."

"You've been the one pointing out the past two days how little I seem to know her," he said caustically as he pressed the gas pedal a little harder.

"Maybe I was wrong."

"You're admitting that?" he asked, casting a quick glance Sam's direction.

"I just... noticed the way that you were looking at her."

"That's something to take notice of?"

"Dean, you notice girls all the time. Mostly checking them out as they walk past you."

"Like that's a crime," he scoffed.

"No, but... you look at Darcy differently."

"I think sharing your brain with William Cantrell has clouded your thinking, there, Einstein."

"You look at her like you looked at Cassie, though without the sort of bitter, rejection overtones."

"Since when do looks have overtones?"

"The point is... Darcy did something that Cassie couldn't: understand and _accept_ the fact that you're a hunter."

"I don't think I like you comparing my girlfriends..."

Sam realized he'd hit a nerve. "I didn't think Darcy was a girlfriend yet, or is she?"

"Dude, let it go, okay? Let's go find some bones, salt 'em, burn 'em and lie low another day or two then we'll blow out of here, onto the next thing."

"Just, how many times did you try to push me into forming a relationship, however brief, with the women that we meet? I don't think I could even count them all. You were always trying to get me to hook up with someone--"

"So you wouldn't be such a pain in the ass."

"So why can't I encourage you to hook up with someone now? So you'll be less of a pain in the ass?"

"I dunno, because every other time I've tried to hook up with someone, you get this... this... _disapproving_ look on your face."

"Every other time I've seen you try to hook up with someone it wasn't with someone you genuinely cared about."

"Whatever, man. You showed me that website, right? She comes from a high-class background. The daughter of some big government dude, right?"

"Deputy Cabinet Secretary, yeah."

"Her sister went to Georgetown, which, if I'm not mistaken, is one of the schools you were looking at before you hit Stanford, was it not? Another one of those crazy expensive ivy-league kind of schools?"

"Yeah..."

"Darcy went to LSU for at least part of a semester, and it had to be on outta state tuition; it had to be crazy expensive, too. She probably cleared out her trust fund to try to make her life work. Uptown girls like that do not dig guys like me."

"In case you hadn't noticed, Dean. She gave up her 'uptown' status to live in this one horse town and be a nighttime radio DJ."

"What, you don't think Daddy Warbucks would approve?"

"You tell me."

"Let's drop this, okay, man? Just... let it go."

* * *

The Road Ahead...

Darcy rushed between other houses, heading into town. It was still quiet this early. A school bus or two. A couple cars. Just one crazy local running after an undead Union soldier. She cast a wary glance towards the courthouse, in the center of town, and its clocktower: 5:38. She still had a little time. She glanced around, hoping to get an idea of where he might be.

Her heart nearly stopped as she saw Sam's lanky form in the middle of the street, with a couple cars on their way.


	4. Chapter 4

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.

Then...

Dean and Sam return to normal at sunrise, and Darcy explains that there was definitely something unnatural going on with them during the darkened hours. They make plans to figure out what's going on, and Sam reveals that Darcy comes from an upper-class family and that her father was a former Deputy Cabinet Secretary. The Winchesters plus one determine that their Civil War counterparts, the Cantrells, suffered a rather traumatic death, at the hands of each other, and prompts a search for the bones to salt and burn. On the way back to the radio tower site, with Darcy home to catch some rest, Sam figures out that Dean really likes her and Dean wants to hear nothing of it.

Now...

* * *

As dusk began to settle in over the pines and oaks, Darcy stirred. Not to the peculiar scratching noises at her door, but because of the thoughts that entered her head.

'Dude, what's taking you forever? Just pick the lock already.'

'C'mon, c'mon...'

'I shoulda asked for a spare key.'

'Almost got it...'

She sleepily stumbled out of the bedroom, in a pair of shorts and a tee shirt, towards the front door, unlocking the deadbolt and opening it.

Sam looked up sheepishly, knelt down on her welcome mat with his lockpicks in his hand.

"We didn't want to wake you," Dean told her.

She shrugged. "How'd it go?" she asked as the boys filed in.

"Not as good as we'd hoped," admitted Sam.

Her heart sank. "You didn't find the bones...?"

Dean shook his head.

"I stopped by the radio station on my way home, told them my aunt died, so I've got a couple days off..."

'At this rate, we may need them,' Dean thought.

"I was afraid of that," she murmured, looking up at him. "You boys hungry? I could make dinner..."

Dean shook his head. "Rain check. It's already starting to get dark. If it ended at sunrise, I'm afraid our bewitching hour may be sunset."

Darcy inhaled slowly, and Sam couldn't help but notice it seemed shaky. "What do we... I mean... If you… Dean..."

He put a hand on her shoulder. "Stay calm, stay cool. It won't last forever, we know that from last night and this morning."

"What if you guys try to hurt each other?"

"If the war hasn't even started yet, surely we have a couple more nights before anything even remotely drastic starts to happen," Dean assured her.

She closed her eyes, nodding. Even Dean's thoughts were comforting, hearing his voice resound in her head. That calming influence would be gone, in no time, she feared.

Sam eased down on a chair in her living room. "We stayed in one spot last night; I imagine we'll do the same again tonight."

Darcy certainly hoped so, as she sat on the couch, Dean flopping down next to her.

"Y'know, we could be gearing ourselves up for something that may not happen yet. We didn't become possessed until after midnight. Maybe it likes the early morning hours and will forgo the night."

Sam didn't say anything. And he didn't think anything either, at least, he tried not to. He figured Dean was saying that for the benefit of Darcy, and while that would be awesome if it were the case, Sam certainly wasn't holding his breath and he wouldn't have advised any of them to do so either.

Darcy found Dean's hand, for a brief moment, and squeezed gently.

'What, are you getting all mushy on me, Darcy?' Dean thought with a wry grin.

He managed to make Darcy smile, though it faded slowly as Dean's thoughts vanished, nearly instantly. Heaven help her, it was starting again.

* * *

She'd decided to take better notes this time, scribbling what seemed like important key events, to try to pinpoint where, exactly, they were in the Cantrell family time line. Tennessee had officially joined the Confederacy. The bloody Battle of Shiloh raged with some hundred thousand men engaged in combat. And William joined the Union Army while John had taken the stance to defend his homeland.

The argument, the sparks were intense. The night before had been more of an educated, scholarly sort of discourse, discussing the possibilities, the potential outcomes, rather than tonight's battle royale. The brothers were clearly trying to goad each other, to harass each other into seeing their own point of view, and, quite obviously, it wasn't working.

At least, Darcy thought, she could keep them safely corralled in her house. A springtime storm blew up somewhere around 2 AM, with a steady pounding rain. She was also relieved they seemed to be far more interested in talking amongst themselves rather than engaging her in conversation as well. That was quite all right with her, as she was content to sit on the couch, watching their possessed selves bicker.

As dawn slowly began its approach, Darcy padded into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee. She closed her eyes, listening to the amplified Southern accents of Sam and Dean. They seemed mad, sure, but they didn't seem ready to kill yet. Plus, she knew they didn't kill each other until after the war. So this night was, for the most part, an annoyance rather than a critical juncture.

She sighed heavily. Any time now, Dean would be back to normal.

Except, her front door slammed with resounding brilliance, shaking a few of her loose CD cases to the floor on the shelf nearest it. Coffee forgotten, she immediately returned to the living room. Dean sat on the couch, seemingly proud of himself.

"D..." She had to catch herself every time she tried to talk. "John?"

"William's gone back to join his regiment."

Her mind reeled: surely to God he didn't mean he was walking back to East Tennessee, the Union strongholds. "Oh. Well, perhaps we should get you to bed then." If she could get Dean to sleep, she could try to find Sam before he got too far.

Dean got to his feet. "Sounds wonderful, love," he said in that thick drawl.

She guided Dean to her bedroom, pulling the covers back and watching as he climbed inside. "Darling, I forgot; the Robertsons asked if I'd stop by... I shouldn't be long. Promise me you'll stay and rest?"

Dean caught her arm before she could pull back from the bed entirely. "Be sure you remind the Robertsons that you have plenty of duties here."

"Of course..."

"They can't be planning another party, not with all the husbands away at war."

She bit the inside of her cheek, thinking fast. "Just... bandages, for your efforts."

He chuckled sleepily. "What a good rebel you are."

"All the better to heal you with, my dear." Sam had long legs, she realized. She was losing precious time and Dean was still holding her arm. She leaned in, kissing his forehead. "Rest," she said, silently pleading that he'd release her.

His grip slowly loosened, and she immediately removed her arm, grabbing a pair of jeans from her dresser, pulling them on over her pajama shorts as she headed down the hallway. She slid her bare feet into her sneakers and ran out into the pouring rain. "Sam!" '_Dammit_,' she chided. "William!"

What Dean had said stuck in her mind. If he was headed back towards the Union bases, she needed to go east. "At least it's _towards_ the sunrise," she muttered under her breath as she took off across the muddy yard. She cast a wary glance at the sky, with the thick rainclouds covering what looked like the majority of the city.

Cupping her hands around her mouth, she cried out again: "William!" Worst case scenario, maybe she could contact the local police, see if they could get an APB out on him. It wouldn't matter for long. Sam would go back to being Sam and William would be gone, at least for another twelve, thirteen hours.

Darcy rushed between other houses, heading into town. It was still quiet this early. A school bus or two. A couple cars. Just one crazy local running after an undead Union soldier. She spied the courthouse, in the center of town, and its clocktower: 5:56. She still had a little time. She scanned the area, hoping to get an idea of where he might be.

Her heart nearly stopped as she saw Sam's lanky form in the middle of the street, with a couple cars on their way.

"_William_!"

He stopped, hearing his name called, and turned. The voice was anxious, frantic. He tilted his head to one side, smiling when she came into view. "Elizabeth," he said, using those long legs of his to remove himself from the middle of the street.

Relief washed over her. "William."

Sam turned, shooting a concerned, spiteful look at the cars that zipped past him. "What are you doing here? These carriages, they're horrible. What's happened to this town?"

"Carriages?" That made sense, actually, she realized, as Dean had complemented her on her nonexistent dress the night before. She shook her head. "It doesn't matter, William. Why don't you come home?"

"Home?" he scoffed. "Home with my brother, that vile betrayer. He's a traitor, Elizabeth. You married a traitor!"

"William, please, just... come stay a little longer."

"When he loses, and he _will_, there'll be no living with him. He'll be horrible. You should leave, Elizabeth. You should leave with me; I can get you safely to the northern states."

"That's not necessary; I'm sure it won't be like that."

"This war, Elizabeth, will forever change this nation. Forever. Their rationale, it's all wrong, completely so."

"The rationale of your brother..."

"Blood," he spat, shaking his head. "It carries no weight any longer. It's no thicker than this rain," he said, looking heavenward as the rain continued to beat down on them.

She decided to try a different tack. "He loves you."

"And I shall always love him, but I shall never forgive him for the atrocities he's helped bring upon these lands."

"Stay, William, please..."

"I cannot, in good consciousness, stay."

She reached out, holding onto Sam's arm, casting a cautious glance at the clocktower again. The local baptist church bells would begin to ring any second now.

"Come with me," Sam pleaded with her. "I can take you away from all of this. All of the fighting is down here. There are hardly any battles being waged in the north. Shiloh? That's just the beginning. I..." He stopped as the carillon began its hourly tune.

Darcy noticed that Sam closed his eyes, seeming to find peace in the song that rang out. She worriedly watched for a break in the clouds, that would prove for certain that this nightly curse would end.

'Where on earth...'

"Oh, thank God, Sam," she said, looking at him and releasing his arm.

"How did we get out here?"

"William was headed back to the Union camp," she said, nodding towards the nearest awning where they could take shelter.

Sam followed her out of the rain then pulled his cell phone out of his jacket pocket. "I'll call Dean, see if he'll come pick us up."

She nodded, wringing the water out of her hair. "Tell him to grab a couple towels."

* * *

Darcy sat, exhausted, curled up on the end of the couch, in a dry pair of jeans and a tee shirt with one of Dean's long-sleeved flannel work shirts pulled tightly around her, her long hair ever so slightly damp. The rain had finally let up, down to a rather annoying mist.

Sam sat on the arm chair, leaning forward, bracing his elbows on his knees, looking at Dean on the opposite end of the couch as they tried to put together the latest facts.

"So, Will was makin' the moves on my girl?" Dean asked.

"Technically it was John's girl," Sam provided.

"Regardless, I think the major question I have is... if, by now, the state was in the Confederacy, then shouldn't you guys have been on the battlefield instead of hanging out at home?" Darcy asked, sipping a cup of coffee.

Sam frowned. "Maybe, because Dean and I are together, making the spirits in one place, they're choosing to live that day together."

"Spirits can choose things like that?" she asked, glancing from Sam to Dean.

Dean shrugged. "They're picky with their victims; they might not be as picky regarding their whole space-time continuum thing."

Sam continued: "Darcy, did they ever mention a date? A year?"

She grabbed the notebook from the coffee table, flipping back a page or two. "Uh... Yeah, the Battle of Shiloh, April '62."

Pulling the laptop from its case, Sam booted it up. "I think we're moving a little faster than I'd hoped."

"Did we hit a warp zone or something?" Darcy asked, cracking a smile and catching one from Dean as well.

Sam didn't say anything; he merely punched in his password and pulled up the notes from his conversation with Julia Owens from the day before. "South Carolina seceded in December 1860; the first shots were fired in April of 1861. Two nights ago, you said no state had left the Union, right?" Off Darcy's nod, he continued: "And last night was 1862... we don't have much time before this war ends."

"I guess the only good news so far is that we are headed towards the summer solstice, so we are still losing hours during the night," Darcy said, taking another sip of coffee.

"Yeah, the bad news is we gotta step it up at Pine Ridge," Dean said. "And it'll be muddy."

"Maybe I can swing by the Register of Deeds office, find the original deed, see if it says anything about the house itself, a plat, a map or something. Maybe we can pinpoint the location, figure out a radius around the house, where the Robertsons would've buried the bodies," suggested Sam.

Dean nodded. "Drop us off at Pine Ridge. Catch up when you're done," he said to Sam, getting to his feet.

* * *

It wasn't as muddy or as wet as the bayou had been, but it certainly didn't help their efforts. Dean sighed, leaning against an old tree and watching as Darcy methodically continued her search. "Are you scared?"

She looked up, brushing her hair back from her face, and managed a slight smile. "I'm sure we'll solve this mystery, Freddy. Maybe Shaggy will bring us some Scooby snacks when he gets here..."

"Sam could use a hair cut," he said with a nod, "but I'm serious, Darcy. Are you?"

She exhaled slowly. "I haven't really slept much. I mean, the evidence says that all three of us died around about the same time. It's possible Elizabeth got in the mix when the boys shot each other. But, then again, why aren't I possessed?"

"The Cantrells obviously had issues with each other. The hatred, from what you've explained, sounds about as bad as you can get. That kind of energy doesn't leave sometimes. That's why spirits stay. They can't let go in life; they can't let go in the afterlife. Maybe Elizabeth had a better head on her shoulders and when her time came, she let go. You didn't say that William thought it was odd you followed after him. It sounded like maybe she was the peace keeper. She wanted to quell the sibling rivalry, but the brothers had seen horrible things in the war. That's the nature of war. Between that, their hatred... It's not that unusual to have spirits with that kinda background."

"Dean..." She bit her lower lip. "What if I fail again?"

He wasn't sure what she meant. "Fail?"

"Sam got away last night. I'm trying to keep you guys safe, in one spot, and I turned my back to make some coffee, and the next thing I know, Sam's in the middle of Main Street in the rain, with cars zipping past him. He could've died this morning and it would've been totally my fault."

"For starters, it would've been the Cantrells fault... Secondly... you're doing a damn good job. Taking notes last night? That was smart. You're doing just fine," he assured her.

She shook her head. "I am scared, Dean," she admitted. "I don't... You're the only one since my sister who even remotely understands me and you coming back into my life, me being able to hear you so far away, I mean that... that can't be a coincidence. There is something there and I don't... I don't want to lose it; I don't know what I'd do if I lost you."

Dean slowly chose his next words. "If you want to talk about failures... You could've died because of me, back in Louisiana. I got you into that situation; that was my fault."

"But, I was fine..."

"Darcy," he said with a slight sigh.

"And you stayed. You care about me, at least a little. I know you did then and I know you still do. And... I care for you, too."

Dean started to open his mouth, to respond, when he heard the sloshing of shoes in mud and an exasperated sigh belonging to his brother. 'We'll talk more, I promise,' he thought, before looking at Sam as he emerged from the trees. "So, got any good news for us?"

Sam held up a folded piece of paper. "I have the plat of the property, and I talked with the historical society again. Best they can figure," he said, unfolding the plat in front of Dean and Darcy, "the house stood roughly here," he said, pointing to the square crudely drawn in with an x through the center. "And that happens to be approximately where the tower is."

Darcy sighed. "Depending on where the bodies are buried, if we disrupt any of those guy-wires, that tower can go down and we're all dead anyway."

Dean looked up at the metal monstrosity. "We'll be careful," he said, as he started looking closer to the tower.

* * *

She was a bundle of nerves, standing at the living room window, watching the sky begin to add bands of pink to the pale blue. Like cotton candy, only that thought didn't help ease Darcy's mind at all. It still meant yet another of the longest nights in her life was practically upon her.

Sam tossed the take-out containers from the local Chinese place into the garbage can in the kitchen and watched as Dean slowly neared her.

"We still have time to fix this," he assured her.

She turned, looking up at him. "Dean, what if it happens tonight? What if this is it? We could be too late."

"All the weapons we have are locked in the Impala's trunk. You have both sets of keys. I know you'll keep us out of there. You'll come up with some brilliant plan, and we'll all still be alive come sunup."

Darcy was still obviously unconvinced.

Dean reached out, touching her face gently, warmly. His eyes searched hers. "There's no one else I'd trust with this."

She closed her eyes, leaning into his hand slightly.

'We still have to have that conversation later, right?'

She nodded.

He leaned in, kissing her forehead gently, before reluctantly pulling back. "Okay, so... tomorrow we'll hit Pine Ridge again. Surely there's something we've missed and tomorrow it'll all become clearer..."

"I was thinking about that," Sam said, slowly easing into the room. "Darcy, the radio station... would they have records about when the tower was built?"

She looked over at Sam, running a hand through her dark hair. "Maybe. I can talk to our GM, he's probably got some kinda file about it... I don't know if there are any FCC regs necessarily about engineering reports or building reports for the tower itself, but if anyone knew, it'd be him. He has an uncanny knack for FCC rules."

"What about the engineering firm that built the tower, those Andrews guys?" Sam asked.

"They're still around. I dunno, Knoxville, I think? I mean, they're buried, naturally, but a junior partner stepped up and took over, kept the name. Whenever we have issues with the tower, I think we still call them."

"So, tomorrow... we'll talk with your boss. We'll still solve this, Darcy," said Dean confidently.

She managed a slight nod, before her breath caught in her throat. Dean's thoughts of the next day were suddenly gone.

"Elizabeth, darlin'..."

She tried to smile, she really did.

* * *

The Road Ahead...

She opened her eyes slowly, looking up at Dean. She'd had dark circles the past few days; they seemed to be getting darker. "Hey," she managed.

"I have good news... and some bad."

"You found the bones?" she asked, sitting up, forcing herself to be awake, hoping to hear what she wanted to hear.

He nodded. "There's only one little problem."

She tried not to look crestfallen.


	5. Chapter 5

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.

Then...

Still no luck on finding the remains of the brothers Cantrell, so Darcy again babysits Civil War soldiers. Only, when she turns her back for one moment, Sam takes off into the driving rain, headed back for his camp. A close shave in the middle of Main Street ends, and the local church carillon signals a sunrise and the Winchesters back to normal. Back on Pine Ridge, Dean and Darcy search for the ages old graves again while Sam does more research in town. Darcy admits she's scared, and she has feelings for Dean, but their conversation is cut short. Sam reveals that x-marks the spot for the Cantrell house, or rather, the radio tower does, making the search for graves potentially deadly even during daylight hours with the fragile guy-wires supporting the radio tower. As night falls, Darcy again watches the historical drama.

Now...

* * *

It was uncomfortable, sitting on the floor in the corner of her own bedroom, but it kept her awake, watching over the gently snoring lump under her covers. It could've been so inviting, to climb into bed beside Dean and snuggle close. She was sure she'd have been asleep the very moment her head hit the pillow, but that, again, could've been very bad.

She'd also been very careful to prevent a reprise of the events of the night before. She'd been clever. She'd been cunning. She'd locked Sam in the one room in the house without any windows ripe for an escape attempt: the bathroom.

Surely he'd forgive her when he returned to his Winchester-self, and would realize it was a precautionary measure. Besides, what else was she supposed to do? Let him run rampant across the old homeland? What if he were to run into someone who wasn't in on the whole "time travel" joke? Try to ask someone where the Union loyalists were located? He could've been picked up by the police. If he'd insisted he was a Civil War soldier, they might've taken fingerprints, run him through their computer systems... and she was sure Sam didn't want that.

'What in God's name am I doing in here? Why is the door locked? This sharing bodies thing is starting to get annoying...'

She groaned, laboriously pushing herself to her feet. She stumblingly padded down the hall and unlocked the bathroom door. "I'm so sorry, Sam."

"Another fun night in Civil War land?"

She shook her head. "Not a damn thing civil about it, not the way you two yell and scream at each other all night long."

"Where's Dean?"

"Asleep," she said, nodding towards her bedroom. "Being 'married', y'know, it doesn't... I mean, I figure..." She sighed. "It's gotta be more acceptable for Dean to sleep there than for 'Elizabeth' to coax 'William' to her bed, y'know?"

Sam smiled slightly. "You don't have to explain it. I know you have your hands full at night."

"Yeah," she said slowly.

"Did we reveal anything else?"

She shook her head. "You guys are starting to seriously sound like broken records."

"Maybe that's a good thing," Sam said. "Maybe they'll relive the same year a couple more days and we'll get this settled."

"A couple more days?" she asked, her shoulders slumping.

"Or sooner," he said, realizing his gaffe. "Listen," he said, moving on quickly. "When does the general manager go into work?"

She rubbed her eyes. "He gets in like... eight, I guess. I dunno for sure; I'm just the night crew."

"Right... What about the engineering firm?"

"In Knoxville? I dunno," she said, yawning, "but they're an hour ahead of us, so... maybe about the same time our GM gets in? Maybe earlier?"

Sam nodded slowly. "Do you know anything about FCC regulations?"

She looked up at him blankly. "I know I have to give a 'legal' ID at various points in my shift, which consists of like... call letters, frequency, location. I dunno much else, sorry. Why?"

He shook his head. "No reason. Why don't you go wake Dean? I'll make some coffee..."

She nodded, and turned, heading back into her bedroom. Again, he looked so peaceful. She wanted to feel that way, too, so badly. "Dean," she murmured, reaching out and placing a hand on his arm. "Dean..."

He stirred, squinting up at her. "Hey... We didn't die."

"You were right," she said, nodding. "Sam's making coffee. We should get moving, y'know... records to review, graves to dig..."

He sat up slowly. "You okay?"

"I don't think I've ever felt so exhausted in my life. I think I'm way past the exhausted stage. This is like... bone weary. My bones hurt. They're tired. I didn't really realize that bones could feel pain or feel tired before."

He reached out, his hand finding hers.

She closed her eyes at the warmth. "Dean," she murmured sleepily.

He gently pulled her down, to sit beside him. "I don't think you need to be helping us with the search today."

"Three heads are better than two, though."

"You said it yourself, you're beyond exhausted. You aren't going to be able to help us if you can't keep your eyes open."

"I'll just stop at the store, get some of those caffeine pills and energy drinks. I'll be roarin' and ready to go in no time."

'But I want you to stay home and get some rest...'

She looked up at him. "But, I need to help..."

"And you do. But you can't right now," he told her before standing up and easing her back against her own warm, soft bed, and covering her up. "Rest."

"But, the station, the tower records..."

"You might be amazed at what Sam and I can come up with on our own. We'll be fine."

"I can't sleep without music, so I'm sure I'll be up in..." She yawned. "No time, really," she slurred, her eyes closing.

Dean stood there for a moment, listening as her breathing evened out. Awake in no time, his foot. He smiled slightly, before heading back out.

* * *

"Just... all I'm asking is that you take it easy and don't make any brash sort of statements regarding any FCC regulations. Darcy said that this guy knows the codes backwards and forwards," said Sam as the Impala cruised towards the radio station.

"And I'm assuring you, we'll get the information we need."

Sam sighed. That still wasn't quite what he'd hoped to hear from his brother.

"Bottom line is, we have to figure this out for ourselves and for Darcy. Our lives especially depend on it. We will figure out a way to get the information from the boss and can carry out the part of the job that we do best."

"All right," said Sam as Dean pulled into an empty parking spot in front of the station.

Dean took a moment to rifle through the cigar box he kept full of IDs and badges, handing one to Sam before securing one for himself. There were two copy shops in town, but neither opened for another half hour, so a replica of an FCC ID card couldn't be made, but with the Dean Winchester-patented confidence and quick-flick, he was sure there'd be no problems.

Sam charged along to keep up with Dean's strides as they neared the front door and entered the building. A receptionist sat at the desk which had been left empty when they first arrived on Darcy's night shift. "Can I help you?" she asked in a warm Southern drawl.

"This is Agent Jefferson; I'm Agent Floyd, we're with the FCC," Dean said, flashing an incorrect ID, proving that the hand really was quicker than the eye. "We need to speak with your general manager, or someone in your engineering department."

"We're a small station, Agent Floyd, we call in outside engineers, but if you'll have a seat for just a moment, I'll let Mr. Collier know you're here."

Sam offered her a tight smile. "Thank you." As soon as they were alone in the lobby, save for the watchful eyes of the morning DJ in the control room, Sam muttered, under his breath: "You are going to take it easy, right?"

Dean glanced at his brother, but before he could respond, there was another welcoming drawl.

"I was not expecting a home-visit from our fine Federal Communications Commission. What can I do for you?"

Mr. Collier, Dean presumed. He was a genteel looking Southern gentleman, in black slacks and a gray long-sleeved oxford and striped power tie. He had salt-and-pepper hair, a few wrinkles around his eyes and on his forehead. However, he glanced from Dean to Sam and back again, summing them up, the elder Winchester suspected, as they weren't as neatly dressed as perhaps normal FCC employees would be.

"Let's cut to the chase, shall we, Mr. Collier?" asked Dean before Sam could try to take the reins of the conversation. "My associate and I were called out here, bright and early, to the middle of _freakin'_ nowhere Tennessee to discuss with you the latest ACLU filing regarding tower sites and Native American burial grounds. They're claiming that, when you transferred your tower site, you ignored certain avenues of investigation to ensure no Native burial grounds would be disturbed and are further claiming you desecrated one on Pine Ridge. They are working on a class-action law suit against you and this station and your friends and mine at the headquarters in Washington."

Sam was mildly shocked when Mr. Collier's demeanor seemed surprised and interested in hearing more rather than throwing them out on their ears. "I'm sure you understand, Mr. Collier," said Sam, jumping into the fray, "that the chairman and commissioners don't want to be involved in something as petty as you missing a crossed 't' or a dotted 'i.' We're hoping we can still head them off at the pass, but we're going to need your help."

"We're going to need any and all records you have regarding the current tower site, the preliminary reports to see if the site was acceptable, any engineering reports, topographical maps, incident reports... In a word, we need _everything_ you have," Dean said, seamlessly continuing.

"That may take some time to gather. Our engineering firm is in Knoxville; I'm not entirely sure where they keep their records, and it's been a couple years since the tower was moved," Collier explained.

"I don't care what it takes. If Agent Jefferson and I can get here at," he checked his watch, "a little after eight, after red-eye flights and driving in, I assure you, you can get this information to us by lunchtime. I don't care if they have to courier the information over, or your fax machine works double-time. We need that information _yesterday_."

By ten thirty that morning, Sam and Dean were spread out in a spare office, documents scattered all over the desk. Four hours later, with some delivered pizzas courtesy Darcy's boss, Dean was leaned back in his chair, his muddy boots propped up on the blotter, a folder open in his lap. Sam held his head in his hand, his elbow resting on the corner of the desk, pouring over blurry faxes from Andrew Brothers Engineering.

"This is taking entirely too long," Dean commented.

"The only thing that might take longer would be to get some kind of sophisticated x-ray equipment to scan the ground surrounding the tower and find those bones."

"We don't have time for that either."

"They're thorough. That's got to be good. I mean, somewhere, if they found the graves of the Cantrells, then it's got to be documented in here."

"That's all well and good, Sammy, but I really don't care about radio wave frequencies and listening area increases. I just want to read about some dead bodies. You'd think that would jump out somewhere."

"Maybe they wanted to gloss over the discovery. Hide it in here somewhere so there aren't just... random grisly details."

"Maybe we really should call the ACLU and tell them it's a Native American burial ground... and have them do all the leg work."

Sam glanced over at his brother. "Have we hit a new low in the research department?"

"I'm about to reach my wit's end, that's what's going on."

"It's fine..."

"It's not fine," Dean said, letting his boots hit the floor. "We're runnin' out of daylight."

"What do you suggest we do? We go back up to Pine Ridge and, what, waste another day turning over rocks? That's not going to get us very far either."

"I dunno, Sam! I dunno what we do."

* * *

It was Dean's turn to watch her sleep again, granted the surroundings were much nicer this time around. He hated the fact that he had to wake her up. He was certain she'd need at least three more days of straight sleep to catch up on all they'd helped her miss. Easing down, he sat on the edge of the bed and reached out, brushing her hair back from her forehead.

'Wake up.'

She winced and murmured: "Not yet."

"Sorry, sweetheart; it's getting close to time."

She opened her eyes slowly, looking up at Dean. The dark circles under her eyes seemed to be getting darker, even with a full day's sleep. "Hey," she managed.

"I have good news... and some bad."

"You found them?" she asked, sitting up, forcing herself to be awake, hoping to hear what she wanted to hear.

He nodded. "There's only one little problem."

She tried not to look crestfallen.

"We can't destroy them until tomorrow."

"Wh... what are you talking about? Salt, fire and voila, done, right?"

"That is the method of choice, yes," said Dean with a nod. "The only problem is... ABE located bones when they were clearing the site... and they were shipped off to the University of Tennessee. Apparently they have a kickass anthropology department, complete with a body farm which sounds, I have to say, totally twisted."

"Knoxville? You're joking..."

"By the time we left here, we'd get into town and the sun would be down and we'd be back to the 1860s, which... I don't think is going to help us too much."

"Dean..." She ran her fingers through her dark hair, pulling her knees to her chest. "So, there's one more night?"

He nodded, holding up the keys to the Impala. "Just one more night. Tomorrow, we'll take off, find the right departmental building, pull a bait-and-switch with some bones and torch 'em off campus."

Sighing, Darcy took the keys. "I can do this one more night."

"Atta girl," he told her, getting to his feet and heading back to the living room.

She remained seated for a minute, gathering her energy for what would prove to be yet another long night. Groaning slightly, she stood, dropping the car keys on the nightstand before changing her clothes. "Just one more day," she told herself.

* * *

'So, this is what normal people feel like when they get a headache.' Darcy rubbed her temples, listening to Sam and Dean drone on as William and John for what felt like an eternity. The argument was heated, but it didn't seem all that different from any other night. Point, counterpoint; insult, retort. It was a vicious cycle they seemed to be trapped in. Utterly annoyed, she finally asked: "Why can't you boys just agree to disagree?"

"Come to some sort of compromise? Elizabeth, darlin', there is no reasoning with this man," Dean said, pointing at Sam. "With no reason, no logic, there can be no compromise. There can be _no_ peace in this family."

"My dear brother," spat Sam, "it is not I with the failings in logic and discourse." He turned to Darcy. "Agreeing with me would prove his point wrong and..." He clucked his tongue. "What a shame it would be for John to admit defeat."

Darcy checked the time: only two more hours until sunup. "Forgive me for... talking out of turn. Perhaps you could spend another few hours discussing your opinions..."

"Perhaps William will take his black Yankee soul out of our house," spat Dean.

"I must say, John, at least my black Yankee soul can't hold a candle for your empty Reb heart to go by. You lost. Admit it."

Dean moved, standing toe-to-toe with his taller brother. "Never."

"You were _weak_."

"You're a _coward_, turning tail and running away from your _home_, betraying your family and your friends. And for _what_? For _nothing_. You're a man without a home, without a family, without anyone. You are _nothing_!"

Sam shoved him backwards. "I am more than you will _ever_ be," he said, before stalking towards the door.

Darcy jumped up from her chair. "Sa... Say, wait!" she said, covering again her near-miss with the name. "William, please. You and John, you're family. You should give each other another chance."

"Did you not hear your husband?" asked Sam. "I have no family. Not him, not you... No one," he said before opening her front door.

"I'm begging you, please, stay..." Darcy said, glancing from Sam to Dean and back again.

"I won't stay where I'm not welcome," Sam said before striding out and slamming the door behind him.

"William!"

"Let him go," said Dean, shaking his head and pacing in front of her couch.

"But... he's your _brother_. Something might happen to him if you just... let him wander like that."

"He's a big boy, Elizabeth; he'll be fine," Dean told her.

Darcy wasn't so sure. "Um... Okay..."

"Honestly? How does a man expect to honor his family by turning from it? Our parents must be rolling in their _graves_."

"If we left now, we could still catch him. You should put your differences aside. It shows greater strength of character..."

Dean rolled his eyes. "William is a lost cause."

'He might not be, if we left _now_,' she thought, biting her lower lip. "Please..."

"It's too late, darlin'. He made up his mind, he made his choices, and now he must live with it until the end of his days. He shall have no peace in the Southland. He should go to that... vile North if he ever wishes happiness again. He shall never receive it here."

"You'd be satisfied, never seeing your own brother again?"

"I shall be ecstatic should I never see that betrayer again." He continued to pace, seemingly deep in thought, one Darcy wished she could crack. There was fifteen minutes of pure silence before he stopped, looking up at her. "Fetch the horses, will you?"

She blinked. "Horses?"

"A ride in the cool evening air sounds like a remedy for this... annoyance."

"But... we don't..." How could she explain that they didn't _have_ horses?

"Darling, please, fetch the horses for the carriage. I shall be right behind you," he said, shooing her towards the front door.

Darcy numbly walked outside. This night was going from bad to worse. And soon he'd wonder why the hell they didn't have a carriage or horses. Maybe she could blame it on Sam, that "William" had absconded with them as well for a ride. Maybe he'd settle in for the night and she could again take off and see if she could locate the lanky, long-legged roaming Winchester.

As promised, Dean was soon behind her. "Perfect," he said with a smile. "Come along," he said, guiding Darcy towards the Impala.

"But, this isn't... It's not... I mean, William took the carriage!" she stammered.

"Hardly. How can you say such a silly thing, when our ride awaits us," he said, unlocking the passenger door to the car.

Her heart sank. The keys. She'd left them in her bedroom and Dean-as-John somehow knew that. It was like the 'dress' comment from before. Same with the carriage and horses. Of course they didn't have one, but they did have the modern-day equivalent. She looked at Dean, who offered her a reassuring smile, before sliding into the car. Heaven help her. A dead guy was about to drive Dean's precious baby.

Dean's driving prowess continued, as controlled by John Cantrell. They cruised around downtown, driving, seemingly, to nowhere in particular. Darcy kept her eyes peeled for any sign of Sam, not really paying attention to where they were headed, until a few turns started looking more and more familiar. She started recognizing certain landmarks: they were heading up towards Pine Ridge.

"Where are we going now?"

"Home," he said, glancing at her. He guided the Impala up to Pine Ridge, as far as the road would allow, before parking and removing the keys. "It's been so long since I've seen home..."

Darcy sighed, climbing out and following Dean up through the darkened path. As they neared the clearing, the blinking of the tower light illuminated the area. The intermittent shadows showed they weren't alone.

Sam's gangly frame turned towards them as they exited the thick wooded path. He shook his head. "John."

"William," returned Dean warily.

'Okay, so this actually might be good,' Darcy realized. The boys were together, not separated with one wandering off to parts unknown.

"Elizabeth, darlin', perhaps it's best you wait with the carriage," Dean said, never taking his eyes off his brother.

"I'm fine here," she assured him.

"Your last chance, Elizabeth. Flee this wicked South. It's the North that holds all the promise of tomorrow," said Sam.

"You boys are acting silly. It's time you settle this right now. It's time you see the error in both your ways," said Darcy, looking from Dean to Sam and back again. "You're family. You're blood."

"My brother died the day he joined those damned Yankees," spat Dean.

Sam sneered. "My brother died long before of stupidity."

"C'mon, stop it, both of you! That's enough!"

"It won't be enough, until he's actually gone," Sam said before running headlong at Dean, tackling him to the ground.

"William, no! John!"

Darcy's pleas fell on deaf ears as the two rolled about, landing punches and attempting to restrain the other. They seemed evenly matched, but she wasn't entirely sure that was a good thing.

"Stop it!" She winced as Sam landed a particularly good hit on Dean's left eye, which was still swollen from their Arkansas hunt. "Please!"

Dean rolled, slamming Sam onto the ground before getting to his feet. "That's it, traitor. Lay on the ground; be the snake that you are."

Sam dried the blood from his mouth and nose before slowly standing. "You will regret this."

"How can I regret something I relish so?" taunted Dean.

Sam lunged again, pummeling Dean as hard as he could until the older Winchester tripped over his own two feet, suddenly finding himself on his back. "Yellow-bellied _fool_," muttered Sam, kicking him.

Darcy moved in quickly, getting between the two warring brothers and pushing Sam back away from Dean. "That's enough! Time to cool down," she said.

"You side with him!" Dean was appalled.

"I side with _peace_," Darcy shot back. "This solves _nothing_."

"It might not, no," said Sam, shoving Darcy aside roughly.

She lost her footing and hit the ground, hard, unable to break her fall with her hands as she'd hoped. The side of her face scraped along the overturned muddy rocks.

Sam continued: "But this will." He pulled a handgun from his jacket pocket, aiming it at Dean, still on the ground. "Best make peace with your Southern maker, brother."

* * *

The Road Ahead...

"Put the gun down," she said, her voice shaking.

"No," Sam said, pressing the gun against her chest harder.

"Please," she whispered. Every muscle in her body tensed, her hands clenched into fists, and she planted her feet. If she was going to try to withstand a blow, she was going to be as prepared as she possibly could be. At least, she'd do what she figured might help.


	6. Chapter 6

For Notes and Disclaimer, please see part one.

Then...

Another uneventful Civil War night turns into a research-filled day for Sam and Dean, while Darcy catches some much-deserved shut-eye. Dean delivers good news and bad shortly before sunset. They found the bones, but they're out of town, and the torching will have to take place the next day, leaving one more night of Civil War madness. The Cantrell brothers' argument becomes potentially deadly up on Pine Ridge, when William produces Sam's gun.

Now...

* * *

Darcy was shaking. Sam's possessed body had murder in his eyes and had the gun aimed at Dean, on the ground, prone, and unarmed. The moment seemed to last forever. "L... Lower the gun, William." Darcy found her voice unwilling to cooperate, barely above a whisper, as fear overtook her.

"Not so mighty now, are you?" sneered Sam.

Dean slid backwards slightly, holding his sore side and looking up at him through his swollen left eye. "Have you become so cowardly, so dishonorable? Has the North rubbed off on you so completely that you would kill a man with no defenses?"

"_Gladly_."

Darcy glanced around, wiping the mud from her face and looking for something, anything, that might help the situation. But she doubted throwing a rock at Sam would do any good at all. If she hit him by some miracle, she could seriously hurt him. If she were to miss--all the more likely--and he turned, on mere instinct from his warring days, she might've found herself shot. Neither of those options seemed entirely appealing, and she wasn't sure what else she could do.

"Then _shoot_!" Dean's voice was clear, resounding, even powerful.

"_No_!" Somehow Darcy had managed to find her own voice again, causing both brothers to look at her, though she noticed Sam's arm never wavered, that the gun was still aimed squarely at Dean's chest.

"Let him, Elizabeth. Let him burn in Hell for all eternity. The innermost circle is saved for traitors and those who shoot their own brothers."

But, of course, the Cantrell brothers weren't burning in Hell. They were wreaking havoc on the Winchesters, on her. "No, he won't. This won't end, ever, not this way."

"What are you talking about?" Sam asked, his head cocked to one side.

"I'm saying..." Gathering up all her courage, she forced one foot in front of the other, until she was standing between Sam and Dean. "That you need to put the gun down now." She'd hoped that William's fondness for Elizabeth would make him, at the very least, think twice about what he was doing.

"This fight doesn't concern you," said Sam. "Move out of the way."

"This has everything to do with me," Darcy told him.

"Elizabeth..." Dean reached out towards her, catching her hand. "This isn't your battle."

"You're my..." She hesitated, glancing back at him. Dean wasn't _technically_ her husband, but their alter egos certainly seemed to be married. "You're my _husband_," she said, her voice stronger. "That makes it my battle."

"It's not your place," Dean told her gently.

"This is exactly my place." She looked up at Sam, into his eyes. "You don't want to do this."

Swallowing hard, he seemed to square his shoulders and steady his aim at Dean, through her. "If that is your place, then so be it."

"Let this _end_. Let this feud _rest_ at long last, William, please..."

Dean tried to stand, managing to get to his knees.

"Please," Darcy repeated, looking up at Sam as tears began to well in her eyes. 'So this is how it ended for Elizabeth. This is how the entire Cantrell family came to an end on Pine Ridge. And the Anderson brothers... and who knows how many others, possessed by these murderous idiots.'

Sam seemed to fidget slightly. "Can't even fight your own battles anymore, can you, John? Made to hide behind hoopskirts and corsets?"

"Elizabeth, leave us," urged Dean, straining to get to his feet. His knees couldn't hold him and he tumbled again.

"You've left him no defense!" Darcy said, ignoring the Winchester behind her and blowing up at the one in front of her. "You have a gun pointed at him! Hoopskirts won't provide anymore protection against a bullet than his _skin_."

"That is the _point_," Sam argued back.

"All you've done, for days and days, is argue, is bicker! I'm tired of it! I'm tired of _this_! Put the gun down!"

Sam took a step towards her, his eyes narrowing. "Never."

She swallowed hard, talking fast: "You must remember the years before this war started, how you two cared for each other, how to behave like brothers with common interests, common goals..."

"Have you not paid attention?" Sam asked, advancing closer to her still. "My brother died ages ago. It's time his body caught up to his soul," he said. "And if you want to leave with him, if that's your decision... then, that's your choice," he said, pressing the gun to her chest.

She glanced skyward. If she could buy Dean a few more seconds, a few more seconds to sunrise, then it was worth it.

Her heart pounded like a jackhammer. Her breath quickened. Slowly, she looked back at Sam, whose iron stare was starting to falter.

"Put the gun down," she said, her voice shaking.

"No," Sam said, pressing the gun against her harder.

"Please," she whispered. Every muscle in her body tensed, her hands clenched into fists, and she planted her feet. If she was going to try to withstand a blow, she was going to try to be as prepared as she possibly could be.

While preparing for the gunshot wound, she inadvertently left her head vulnerable. As the boys thoughts returned, she fell forward, landing on her knees. She put a hand over her chest, where the gun had been aimed mere seconds before.

Dean had noticed Darcy standing in front of him first. Only when she collapsed did he see the gun in his brother's hand, and the shocked look on Sam's face. "Darcy?"

Sam immediately lowered the weapon, removing the clip from the gun and, to his horror, the chambered round.

Dean moved to pull her into his arms, ignoring the soreness and pain his rebelling body cried out in. "Darcy, I've got you; you're okay." Her whole body seemed to be trembling.

"Dean," she whispered, feeling his strong arms wrap her up tightly.

"I..." Sam wasn't sure what to say.

"It's okay, Sam. I know it wasn't you," Darcy managed, looking up at him.

"Let's get outta here, huh?" Dean asked, glancing at the tower and realizing they'd made it up to Pine Ridge.

Sam put the empty gun in the back waistband of his jeans, and the ammunition into his coat pocket, before offering Darcy a hand, pulling her to her feet, followed by Dean.

"The Impala's parked at the end of the road," Darcy said, feeling Dean's arm circle her waist.

"The Impala?" Dean asked, frowning slightly.

"Yeah, you drive pretty good for a dead guy," she said with a smile marred by her nerves.

Dean winced.

* * *

After a round of showers and first aid, Darcy made breakfast. Scrambled eggs, sausage, fruit, coffee, and even homemade biscuits. It gave her something to do, something to focus on, so she wouldn't relive the morning's events.

Dean had ordered his fair share of grand slam breakfasts at diners across the country. At first, he didn't think it would be all that different, but there was something about a home-cooked meal, something that made it taste better.

Sam's thoughts drifted to Jess, to the apartment in Palo Alto. She used to get up early and make breakfast. Waffles or pancakes. Omelets. He didn't realize how much he missed that, not until that morning.

Not much was said over breakfast. The boys took the time to savor their meal, and Darcy tried not to focus too much on the bruises both boys had on their faces. Dean's eye wasn't quite as swollen, not after holding an ice pack against his face for the better part of a half hour.

Her own face was a little sore, scraped up. She hadn't realized it up on Pine Ridge, but when they'd made it back to her house, she discovered she'd managed to split her lower lip somewhere in the scuffle.

Dean cleared away the dishes from the table, something he wasn't sure he'd ever done, after they finished. He glanced knowingly at Sam, who shoved his hands in his pockets.

"So," Sam said, "I'm gonna go... put some gas in the Impala. I'll be back, y'know, later."

Darcy leaned against the kitchen counter, next to Dean, and they both watched Sam quietly leave.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Dean asked. He tried his best to keep his voice from being harsh.

She looked up at him.

"Getting between me and Sam, when Sam had a gun? A loaded gun!"

She shook her head. "I wasn't about to let you die."

"I'm not too thrilled with the idea of you dying either," he told her.

"Better me than you."

Dean looked at her incredulously. "What? How do you figure that?"

"I spin tunes for a living. You rid the world of evil. There was no contest."

"You could do more."

"Dean, nobody listens to me. Nobody with any authority will listen to a crackpot who wanders in off the streets and solves crimes because she can read their minds."

"You don't know that."

"I was given a field sobriety test. When I passed it, I was taken for psychiatric evaluation and kept for a week. I'm not going through that again."

He scratched at the back of his neck. "I know people; I've met some members of law enforcement that... that have seen what we do, that have protected Sammy and me. I could put you in contact with them."

"Anybody can solve regular crimes, though. I imagine there's only a handful that do what you do."

"There are some hunters out there that are better than me."

She laughed a little. "I doubt that, very seriously."

He inhaled slowly. "It's just..." His thoughts landed on his father, on John's sacrifice for his eldest son.

"Because, you're worth it," she said. "You were worth it to your father, and you are worth it to me."

"I'm no saint--"

She cut him off. "You don't have to be."

'I'm not worth this, though,' he thought. He reached out, his fingertips light across the scabbed over scrape on her cheek, her split lip.

"You are to me," she repeated softly.

"Nobody's ever done that for me, outside family. Intentionally gone into harm's way."

"I'd do it again."

"Hopefully, you won't have to."

"Hopefully," she agreed.

He hesitated, getting lost in her green eyes. He was sure she knew exactly what he was about to do. Even if she weren't telepathic, he figured it would've been pretty clear. He leaned in slowly.

She'd only thought her heart was pounding earlier that morning. She wouldn't be surprised if her whole body pulsed in time with her rapid beat.

It seemed to take both forever and no time at all for his lips to meet hers in a warm, soft--even sweet--first kiss. He pulled back slowly, but his hands rested on her hips.

Darcy was glad he was keeping her steady. Between the week's exhaustion, the near death experience, and the world's best kiss, she wasn't sure her own two feet would hold her. If he let her go, she wasn't sure if she'd fall over or float. Her body seemed confused, tired but at the same time exhilarated.

It didn't help that his thoughts were asking all the questions she wanted answers to. What did that mean? Was it good? Was it bad?

Dean knew he wasn't normally a dating guy, a take-it-slow kind of guy. But, he didn't want to lose her or hurt her. Her silence made him fear the worst.

She shook her head before rocking up on her toes, so that her lips could find his. Her arms eased around him as he pulled her closer.

* * *

Sam had filled the Impala's gas tank, bought lighter fluid at a hardware store and salt in bulk at a grocery store. He'd gone by the library to find out exactly where they'd need to go on the University of Tennessee campus to try to locate the Cantrells bones. He'd wasted as much time as he possibly could that morning, and was about to call and see if they were ready yet when his cell phone rang. He laughed a little when he saw Dean's name on the caller ID. "You telepathic now?" Sam teased.

"What?" Confusion was evident in his brother's voice.

"Never mind," Sam said with a grin.

Dean cleared his throat slightly. "Get your ass back over here. We've got bones to salt and burn."

Sam turned the key, letting the Impala rumble to life. "Be right there," he said, before ending the call.

The drive to Darcy's house was a short one. She definitely lived in a small town. By the time he pulled into her driveway, he saw Dean and Darcy both on the front porch. Dean's duffel bag was at his feet. Darcy's backpack was slung over one shoulder. Parking the car, he slowly exited.

"I wish you'd stay," Dean told her.

"These dead assholes have annoyed me as much, if not more, than you. I want to be there when you finish it. I want to see this process. I want to know it's done."

"You're exhausted!"

"It's an hour to Knoxville. I can sleep in the car."

"So, you'll just sleep one measly hour?"

"And, God willing, tonight, too."

Dean sighed heavily.

"It's all right with me so long as I get shotgun this time," Sam called from the driveway.

The two on the porch turned to look at him.

Darcy eased past Dean. "Fair enough."

Dean shot his brother an annoyed look.

Sam shrugged and opened the door to the backseat for Darcy.

Sighing, Dean got behind the wheel.

"Printed off a campus map," Sam commented as he slid into the passenger seat.

Dean merely nodded as he backed out of the drive. The nearest Interstate interchange was only a few minutes from Darcy's house. As he approached I-40, however, he chanced a glance at her in the rear view mirror. Shaking his head, he spotted a gas station and pulled in.

Sam was momentarily alarmed when Dean deviated from the plan. He was confused when he realized where they had stopped. "I already filled us up."

"I know," Dean said, throwing the car into park.

Sam watched as his big brother opened the door to the backseat. He slid Darcy's backpack onto the floorboards behind the driver's seat, then carefully eased her into a laying position. She didn't look too comfortable with her head against the window. He even eased his prized leather jacket over her sleeping form.

Sam watched in silence, but grinned, as Dean re-entered the car and put it back into gear.

"Dude, just shut up."

"I didn't say anything," Sam said, still smiling.

The younger Winchester was content to let the scenery roll past them for several miles, but he couldn't help but notice Dean's eyes occasionally flick to the rear view mirror, to chance a glance at the sleeping girl. "So, did the two of you...?"

Dean's jaw was set as he glanced at his little brother. "We needed some time to talk," he said, his eyes refocusing on the road ahead. "And I figured it was best for her not to have to deal with your thoughts, too."

"And, did you have a good... talk?" Sam wasn't entirely sure he bought his big brother's story. "It was an awfully long discussion."

"We had to talk about why anyone would intentionally put themselves in front of you holding a gun."

Sam quieted, but not for long. "She loves you."

Dean sighed. Instead of trying to make Darcy stay home, perhaps he should've insisted on Sam's staying behind.

"She does. It's easy to see. No one else would do that, stand in the path of a bullet, stand with the gun against her like that. Not if she didn't love you."

"Stop throwing that word around, all right?"

"What, because, if you hear it, maybe it becomes real? Maybe stoic Dean Winchester, the ultimate heart breaker and consummate lone wolf, has a heart that beats in his chest, one that loves Darcy back?"

"I've almost gotten her killed twice," Dean said, snapping. "She shouldn't care about me, not at all. Not if all I do is put her in harm's way."

"She's still alive."

"Yeah. This time. Next time, she might not be so lucky."

"Dean, as much as I wish Jessica were still alive, I'm glad I had some time with her. I wish I could've saved her, but I have awesome memories, time that I cherish. You have that opportunity with Darcy. You have more opportunities with her than I had with Jess."

Dean glanced again at Darcy, who was still sleeping peacefully.

"She knows, Dean. She knows what you do and she's not scared of it. She's not scared of you."

"I'm scared for her."

Sam hadn't expected that. "What?"

"Mom... Jess... The one Dad loved most, the one you loved most... they don't last. I won't do that, not to her."

"What makes you think you have a choice?" asked Sam. "What makes you think she'll accept you pushing her away?" When Dean didn't answer, Sam started speaking again, slowly. "When I first met Jess, I did the same thing. I said she was too good for me. I said I wasn't good enough for her. She'd never understand where I was coming from. She'd never know the real me. Maybe she didn't know I was a hunter, but she knew who I was at Stanford. I was a kid on a scholarship with a job at the library. I was who I'd always wanted to be. Normal. Safe.

"It took a year for me to ask her out. A year of her coming around, flirting, having me get all sorts of books down for her--the more obscure, the better--for me to realize that, maybe, it was okay. Then, it was a year of dating, and two years of living together... I had the opportunity of a lifetime with Jess." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder at Darcy. "That one's yours."

Dean shook his head. "Sammy..."

"I bet she'd even come with us if you asked."

"Just, stop it, all right? I'm not you. She's not Jess. I'm not Dad and she's not Mom. I won't knowingly put her in harm's way, not if I can help it. So just... cut it out."

* * *

The Road Ahead...

"He's good at that," Sam told her. "Saving people."

"So, it's only fair he get saved in return, at least once," she said with a slight, soft smile.

"For some reason, he doesn't think he's worth saving," Sam said quietly.

"Well, I guess you and me, we know better."

Sam nodded. "Even if you're calling last night's events a marker from New Orleans… you didn't owe me anything."

"And break up the Hardy boys? Are you kidding?"


	7. Chapter 7

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.

Additional note, very special thanks to my big brother, who went with me to Neyland Stadium last year for two reasons... One, to see the Vols play at home (Go Big Orange!) and two, to do on-site research for this chapter.

Then...

Sam and Dean's possessions nearly turn deadly. Before heading off to Knoxville to locate and burn the bones of the Cantrell brothers, Dean talks with Darcy about her heroics. On the Interstate, with Darcy dead asleep in the back, Sam tries to convince Dean that the elder Winchester has the unique opportunity for a little happiness. Dean doesn't see it that way.

Now...

* * *

Darcy woke to the burst of a train whistle. She opened her eyes and blinked, but nothing really sank in, not at first. She also heard rain on a metal roof. In her adopted home town, the tracks had long since been removed. And her roof was regular shingles, not tin. Inhaling deeply, she smelled a wonderful mix of leather and cologne. She groaned slightly, struggling to focus.

The metal roof, she realized, was that of the Impala. The scent, Dean's jacket. She sat up, running a hand over her face. She realized he saw Knoxville's unique skyline with the Sunsphere in the distance. Glancing around, she spotted Neyland Stadium. They'd made it to UT's campus.

She slowly climbed out of the car, leaving Dean's precious jacket on the backseat. As the rain pelted down, she spotted Sam across the street, under a black umbrella.

The younger Winchester cast a quick glance up at the stadium, then sprinted across the street to meet her, shielding her with the umbrella. "Sleepyhead," he goaded gently.

She smiled. "Yeah, yeah. How long was I out?"

Sam checked his watch. "Not quite an hour and a half."

"Where's Dean?"

"Breaking into a professor's office," he said with a slight wince.

She yawned, nodding.

"You can go back to sleep if you'd like."

She shook her head. "I want to see the end of this."

She was tenacious, Sam decided, like his brother. She might be able to keep up with Dean, to be an equal. He regretted not trusting her when they met. "Listen, Darcy, I, uh…"

Her green eyes went from watching the stadium to casting a cautious look at Sam as he worked his way through his jumbled thoughts. "It's okay, Sam."

"What I did was unacceptable."

"It was understandable," she corrected gently.

"What you've done for us this week…"

"I just returned the favor. Your brother, while he'll never admit it to me for reasons I don't understand, saved my life. I know he did. I know he's the reason I woke up from a coma in the hospital in New Orleans. The doctor… after Dean finally left, the doctor said they were making arrangements for me, that I would be in a persistent, vegetative state. Indefinitely."

Sam looked at her.

"The doctors had already written me off, but Dean… the one time he leaves my side for more than two seconds since I was admitted, that's when I wake up. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that he's the one that saved me. I don't know what he did, and maybe I don't want to know the particulars, but I do know he's the reason I'm standing here today."

"He's good at that," Sam told her. "Saving people."

"So, it's only fair he get saved in return, at least once," she said with a slight, soft smile.

"For some reason, he doesn't think he's worth saving," Sam said quietly.

"Well, I guess you and me, we know better."

Sam nodded. "Even if you're calling last night's events a marker from New Orleans… you didn't owe me anything."

"And break up the Hardy boys? Are you kidding?"

His smile was brief and slight. "Seriously."

"I know how Dean feels about you, and I know how you feel about him in return. Protecting one means protecting both. Anyone who thinks otherwise… they obviously don't know you, either of you."

He thought about that for a moment. They did work best together. They could protect each other, take care of each other. He had to begrudgingly admit that John had trained them--raised them--right. "I wish Dean had met you before."

She glanced over, curious. "What?"

"Before Dad died, before I… When all three of us were a family, a unit. It wasn't perfect--far from it." He thought, briefly, about the knock-down, drag-outs he and John used to have. "But, you wouldn't have had to feel so different, and Dean… Dean might've had a chance to be normal, too."

She smiled a little, looking down. "I think I still would've been a freak, just a little less lonely."

Their conversation was forgotten as the doors opened and Dean emerged empty handed.

Darcy's face fell. No bones?

"Well?" Sam asked as Dean neared them.

"They're stored." He pulled a piece of paper from his blue jeans pocket. "I got the storage locker information and the address from the ledger in his office." He looked at Darcy, reading her expression. "You didn't really expect the professor to have the skeletons in his closet, did you?" he asked, flashing her a grin.

"Well, kinda," she admitted.

"Winchester luck," Sam told her, shaking his head and climbing into the back of the Impala, relinquishing "shotgun" to Darcy without a fight.

Rather than walking around the car in the rain, she slid in from Dean's door and scooted across the front bench seat.

Dean, with Darcy's help, was able to navigate campus and locate the storage facility where the bones were being held. The Winchester brothers worked quickly to pick the locks while Darcy kept a keen eye, and ear, out for patrolling campus police. The work was quick, and relatively easier than any of them had suspected, and they soon had two plastic bins with the ancient bones in the trunk.

"I saw a little park when we came in, on the other side of campus where I think we could torch 'em," Dean said as the Impala idled briefly at a stop sign before pulling through the intersection.

"The sooner the better," Sam agreed, checking the campus map he'd printed off. "Looks like Tyson Park, off Kingston Pike."

"Dean…"

He glanced over at Darcy.

"Let's take them home."

"Home?" he repeated.

"They were removed from their home, maybe that's what upset them. Even though their bones were out here in Knoxville, their spirits found you back on Pine Ridge. Why don't we let their bones rest with their spirits?" she ventured.

"Because… Tyson Park's right there," he said, pointing towards a tiny swath of green up ahead.

"We're in the middle of downtown Knoxville. Someone could easily spot us here. Nobody'll find us on Pine Ridge."

Sam had to admit, she had a point there. "Less likely to cause a scene," he said slowly.

Dean tried not to think about the fact that he was considering transporting the bones of Civil War soldiers across county lines in his precious Impala's trunk. If it weren't for the fact that the whole reason they'd stopped in to see Darcy was because they were on the run from the Feds, he might've said screw it and he'd have torched them immediately. As it was, as much as he hated to admit it, they did have points. Sort of. Reluctantly, he agreed. "All right, all right. Back to Pine Ridge."

* * *

It wasn't a grand funeral, as Darcy might've pictured. Instead, it was a pair of shallow graves, on the edge of the tree line. The bodies weren't laid out neatly, though they were carefully transferred from the boxes they'd been residing in to the ground.

Sam liberally salted their bones with rock salt.

Dean uncapped the gasoline can and started to pour, but stopped, and offered it to Darcy.

She looked up at him questioningly for a moment, but took it, and soaked both the Cantrells, first John, then William. "No more fighting," she told them quietly as she screwed the cap back on.

"And no more possessing people," Dean added, before lighting two books of matches. He threw them both into the open graves at the same time, listening to the familiar whoosh as the gasoline caught fire.

Darcy watched, unable to pull her eyes from the flickering flames as Dean eased an arm around her shoulders. After all, she might've helped with the Voodoo Priestess before, but she'd been unavailable for the end of the mystery. This time, she was still around, and standing, to see the mission come to its completion.

"Your first salt-and-burn. It's a milestone," Sam said, glancing over at Darcy with a slight smile.

She smiled back at him. "Thanks, Sam."

"We should celebrate," he said teasingly.

"Only if it involves sleep," she said, easing her arm around Dean's waist.

"It has been a crazy couple days," Dean admitted. Even though he hadn't necessarily required sleep while he'd been possessed, it seemed as though the lack of rest was catching up to him as he stood there. The fatigue of digging even the small graves had been taxing, after driving an hour down to Knoxville and an hour back, not to mention sneaking across all of campus to locate the remains.

"Y'know, you boys are more than welcome to actually stay, y'know, and not work, if that's even possible for you guys," she said, glancing up at Dean.

He laughed. He wasn't sure that was possible either, after everything that had happened. What Sam had said earlier was true, about Winchester luck. If it weren't for bad luck, they'd have no luck at all. "I think we could definitely stay the night, don't you, Sammy?"

Sam glanced over, nodding. He liked seeing them together. His brother looked relaxed, for being exhausted. He knew Dean hadn't had the best of years, what with their father, John, dying, and his last warning. Dean had felt tremendous guilt about what had happened, after…

Darcy looked up when Sam's thoughts came to a screeching, abrupt halt. He offered her a tight, strained smile, realizing she'd caught that as well.

She might've said something, but she didn't want to cause a discussion, and it seemed like whatever it was Sam didn't want her to know could cause a rift.

Once the gasoline had finally burned off, Sam and Dean set about covering over the charred remains with damp earth. They lugged everything back down the ridge, to where the Impala waited for them at the end of the dirt road.

* * *

The rest of the afternoon went by in relative peace. It was awkward at first, as Sam and Dean had to adjust to the fact that there wasn't a hunt to be researching or a new location to drive towards. It was different, taking it easy.

For the most part, they sat around and swapped stories. Darcy was regaled with tales of prank wars, the time Dean got caught busting curfew, and the time Sam watched a scary movie and sat awake all night with the lights on. Dean had warned him it was too scary for the younger boy to handle, but he'd insisted he'd be fine, and he'd been wrong.

Darcy shared memories of her childhood and her sister. Things she'd never told anyone, not in the near decade since Sheila had died. The times she'd cover for Sheila's rendezvous with a boyfriend, to the times Sheila would cover for her when she'd slip with her gift.

Dean realized Darcy'd always walked a tightrope. She couldn't wander too far, which prevented anyone from being close to her at all. No one else would've understood, not unless they had another, equally crazy secret.

In their differences, hers, his, and even Sam's, they were the same. Those who knew what went bump in the night, that there were things out there far beyond the scope of "normal" were a minority. Until Darcy had met Dean, she didn't realize there were others like that, like her.

While she knew the truth, she was also grounded. Not every decision was life or death. Not every thing had to be so grandiose. Dean found himself wanting that luxury and the knowledge of how to accept that. If he could teach her there were more out there, others like her, maybe she could teach him, in return, how to want something good for himself that lasted longer than fleeting seconds and how to accept that, sometimes, it was okay to want that.

Dinner was homemade. It was something Darcy rarely got to do for anyone other than herself, and it was something the boys never got to enjoy.

As sundown approached, Dean watched the fear creep across Darcy's face. Without thinking about it, he gently reached out and placed his warm hand over hers. She didn't seem to notice.

Dean knew that Darcy's living nightmare wouldn't repeat itself again that night, but he understood her anxiety.

As the sun dipped lower and lower, Dean started pestering Sam about a story from ages past, involving a gym teacher and chewing gum. Darcy was only marginally paying attention, as dread slowly consumed her. She waited for the moment when everything would go silent, when everything would turn off, except for her own thoughts.

The moment never came. Seconds turned into minutes, and Sam kept trying to insist that he hadn't been the mastermind behind the prank, that he'd been wrongly accused and had taken the fall for a classmate.

Darcy found herself breathing a sigh of relief. She hadn't even realized she'd been holding her breath.

She hadn't even realized Dean had been holding her hand until he slowly released it. He glanced casually at her, and caught a tender smile aimed his direction.

As the night wore on, Sam found himself more and more a third wheel. He tried a few times to excuse himself, to head off for whatever lame reason he could come up with, to even rent a hotel room for the night so Dean and Darcy might have time by themselves.

Darcy had insisted that he stay, that, while she wished she had a proper guest room, the couch wasn't bad, and Dean could attest to that.

By the time ten o'clock had rolled around, even the seasoned night owls were tired. Darcy retrieved a spare blanket for Sam from the linen closet before she and Dean got ready for bed, retiring to her bedroom.

They just looked at each other for a long moment.

It was Darcy who smiled first, albeit nervously. "I kept telling myself this wouldn't be weird, but I guess it's a little weird, huh?" It was also odd, hearing Sam's nonchalant thoughts. She appreciated his efforts, but, ultimately, it didn't matter. It was her turn to feel awkward as she adjusted to the situation.

"It's just sleeping, right? Two exhausted people, sleeping in the same room."

"Right," she said with a nod.

It was Dean who climbed into bed first, and pulled back the covers for them both. Quietly, Darcy eased in. He pulled her somewhat close, keeping a protective arm around her. 'My turn to keep you safe for the night.'

She closed her eyes, letting out a soft, contented sigh.

* * *

She woke slowly with the afternoon sun shining into the bedroom window.

Sleep.

She'd almost forgotten what that was like. Smiling, she turned, fully expecting to see a still-snoozing Dean beside her. The other half of her bed, however, was empty.

"Dean…?"

The silence that answered in response was painful. His thoughts were gone. So were Sam's.

Slowly easing out of bed, she checked the living room, just in case.

The cream colored couch where Sam had slept the previous night was vacant. The blanket he'd used was neatly folded on the ottoman.

It was almost as though she hadn't had house guests at all. Padding into the kitchen, she found the only evidence that the Winchester brothers hadn't just mysteriously vanished. There were two used coffee mugs in the sink, and a half-empty pot of coffee.

Biting her lower lip, she lifted the pot, to discover the consistency of what remained was sludge. They must've left hours ago. She replaced it on the cold burner and leaned against the counter.

The same counter she'd leaned against the day before with Dean, when he'd pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

She'd known--she'd always known--that he was a loner, a wanderer. She'd thought they'd had a kind of understanding, a kind of bond. One that at least warranted his telling her goodbye before he left.

She guessed she was wrong.

She rubbed at her forehead with a heavy sigh. It was then that she spotted the folded piece of paper on her kitchen table. Her name was written in his distinctive scrawl.

With trepidation, she lifted it. With trembling fingers, she unfolded it.

"Darcy--

I'm so sorry that I can't stay long enough to say goodbye. We've got to meet Bobby in Ohio. He's another hunter, a friend. Because his time is limited, so is ours.

Sam found a lead on a hunt in Illinois. I guess duty calls.

Someday, if life is ever different, I hope there's a possibility for more. For us.

Dean"

She shook her head. "Like there's ever any hope for that. For us," she said, heartbroken.

* * *

Bobby Singer had been a hunter--an observer--a long time. He could tell something was bothering Dean as the younger man swapped the front and back license tags on the Impala, from the Winchester home state of Kansas to Ohio. He could tell, too, that something was eating at Sam, the way the boy was unable to sit still. Annoyed at ignoring the elephant in the middle of the dusty back road, he broke the silence. "All right, what is it? Those shiners you got, you boys gave them to each other, or what?"

Sam and Dean exchanged looks. They both looked like hell, and, technically, they had beaten each other up, though not of their own volition.

"Not exactly," Sam answered, causing Dean to roll his eyes.

"Then, what's going on?" pressed Bobby.

"Sammy," Dean said warningly.

"What's she there for?" Sam asked. "Really?"

"Enough!" Dean exploded, tossing his screw driver into the tool box.

Bobby was lost. "She who?"

"Nobody," Dean answered a little too quickly, a little too unconvincingly.

"Dean--"

The elder Winchester rounded on his brother again, effectively ending whatever tirade Sam might've been preparing to start. "No, Sammy, I'm done having this conversation with you. We've had the same one though three states and I'm _done_ with it."

"All right; take it easy," Bobby said, trying to placate Dean. "I didn't mean to stir trouble. I was hoping to end it," he admitted.

Sam sighed, taking his usual seat in the Impala.

Bobby took a moment to examine Dean. There was a haunted, lost look in his eyes. The boy was in pain, it was as plain as day. Bobby was fairly certain it had to be self-inflicted. "Dean…"

He set his jaw tightly, something Bobby had seen John Winchester do a hundred times. It signified the end of a topic. "We've gotta go, Bobby. Sam thinks there's something worth killin' in Illinois and daylight's burning."

Bobby was silent, unmoving, for a moment, searching the younger man's eyes. "Whatever it is," he started slowly, "me and Sam, we aren't your enemies."

Dean groaned. "For the love of _God_, can we please not do this? It's got nothing to do with you, Bobby, and nothing to do with Sam either. It's all on me. Just let me deal with it without the two of you psychoanalyzing every move I make and every thing I say."

Bobby inhaled, but nodded. "If you need me, you boys know how to find me."

Dean secured his tool box in the trunk, slamming the lid with more force than was necessary. "Thanks for the tags, Bobby." His voice was tight, strained.

"No problem."

With a slight nod, Dean eased behind the wheel of his baby and listened as she rumbled to life.

The next thirty miles west were in relative silence. Dean hadn't even bothered with his mullet-rock cassette collection, content to let the scenery roll by. He didn't realize that a ticking time bomb sat in the seat beside him.

"I know you, Dean. I know you want a normal life. Who wouldn't? Even Dad did, and Bobby--"

"Dammit, Sammy!"

Before his older brother could try to silence him again, he immediately launched into what he'd been brooding about since they'd pulled away from Bobby. "No! Nobody chooses to be a hunter. Killing might make you happy, but it's a happiness that doesn't last. There's an emptiness that grows inside you, that gnaws at you. That girl, the one you _left_ while she slept, has the potential to make you genuinely happy, to give you a real life. You can't tell me that, given the choice, you wouldn't opt for that. For apple pie and baseball and a mortgage on a house with the picket fence and the kids. You _can't_ tell me that!"

Dean seethed with anger. "Oh, I can't, huh? Sure I can. 'I don't want that life.' Not now. That's just not a life for us, Sam. Me and Darcy…" He hesitated. "If things were different maybe. But they aren't. Like there's ever any hope for that? For 'us'?" He shook his head. "We've got work to do," he said, gunning the engine a little harder.

Silence fell over the Chevy again.

Dean would never admit it out loud, but Sam was right. He wanted normalcy. He craved it, even dreamed about it from time to time. How amazing that would be, to be safe, to not have to worry about Sam, about demons and ghosts, to stop being Atlas for a while, to let the fate of the world rest on someone else's shoulders.

Sam deserved that, and Darcy. Even he did… didn't he?

* * *

End.


End file.
